How to cleave a Si wafer with a diamond scribe
How to cleave a Si wafer without a diamond scribe
Glossary
Wafer cleaving is a must-have skill for semiconductor process engineers and researchers. Among all the different wafer cleaving methods that we've used/seen, the one demonstrated here shows the best results in terms of least particles on the final sample and least wear and tear of the diamond scribe.
This is the Si wafer that we are going to cleave. 100mm, 525um thick, SSP, <100>. On a <100> silicon wafer, it is possible to cleave at 90deg prependicular to those flats (P type). |
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| Tools: a diamond scribe, some cleanroom tissue, and a pair of sharp tip tweezers. |  |
| If you don't have this kind of tweezers, you can use any thin/sharp stuff around you, for example a paper clip. |  |
| This is how you are going to use it. |  |
| At first, make a tiny scratch at the wafer edge with the diamond scribe, just like writing with a pen. Don't use much force. It is not necessary and will generate a lot of particles. |  |
| This is the scratch. One is just enough.You don't have to do it many many times. |  |
| Now, insert the tip of the tweezers right underneath the scratch. |  |
| You can also use the modified paper clip (in fact, easier to handle) |  |
| Press gently at the wafer edge next to the scratch that you just made. The wafer should break nicely. |  |
| Repeat this many times to produce the sample size you need. |  |
| Job done. |  |