Low-cost tilt monitoring system for spin coater calibration

The spin coating process became the most widely used technique in the fabrication industry for thin film coating on a substrate by centrifugal force. Unfortunately, frequent usage of spin coater might induce a tilted surface of the chuck (i.e. the sample holder). A tilted chuck might induce inhomogeneity of the coating layer. Among the machine's calibration techniques, nullifying the tilt before the spin coating process is the most important step. However, to our knowledge, none of the spin coaters was introduced with the chuck's tilt monitoring during the spin coating process. Thus, investigating the discrete condition during the spin coating process is necessary. In this work, the tilt monitoring system for the spin coater was implemented based on an Arduino Uno microcontroller and distance sensor. A spin coater has been implemented to test the tilt surface monitoring during spinning ranges from 350rpm to 1000rpm. The measurement was done under two conditions: flat (0.00 degrees) and tilted (5.71 degrees). The setup was able to measure up to 0.01 degrees of the tilt.