Evaluation of the in-plane micro-deformation distribution characteristics of polishing pad surface by conditioning process

Abstract

In polishing, a conditioning process is generally used for the regeneration of pad surface asperity. The pad surface asperity affects the polishing performance, and so it is important to develop a method for its evaluation. In this paper, we propose a novel evaluation method for the in-plane micro-deformation distribution of pad surface asperity using digital image correlation (DIC) method. The results indicated that the pad surface deforms over 40μm at maximum with the conditioning process. Moreover, the following points were observed. (1) The in-plane deformation value decreases with an increase in the mesh size of conditioner grains. (2) The in-plane deformation value increases with the increases in both the conditioning time and the applied contact pressure.