Methods and apparatus to control zone temperatures of a solar cell production system

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-11538956-B2
Application number	US-201916394498-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Apr 25, 2019
Priority date	Apr 27, 2018
Publication date	Dec 27, 2022
Grant date	Dec 27, 2022

Abstract

Methods and apparatus to control zone temperatures in a solar cell production system are disclosed. An example furnace to fire photovoltaic cells includes: a plurality of zones comprising firing elements configured to fire a metallization layer of photovoltaic cells by heating the photovoltaic cells in the zones; one or more belts configured to transport photovoltaic cells through a sequence of the plurality of zones; a user interface comprising one or more input devices; and control circuitry configured to: control the firing elements for the plurality of zones; and modify a configuration of two or more of the plurality of zones based on input received via the input device.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A furnace to fire photovoltaic cells, the furnace comprising:
a plurality of zones comprising firing elements configured to fire a metallization layer of photovoltaic cells by heating the photovoltaic cells in the zones;
one or more belts configured to transport photovoltaic cells through a sequence of the plurality of zones;
a user interface comprising one or more input devices; and
control circuitry configured to:
control the firing elements for the plurality of zones;
modify a configuration of two or more zones of the plurality of zones based on input received via the input device;
receive a peak cell temperature via the one or more input devices; and
modify the configuration of the two or more zones of the plurality of zones to achieve the peak cell temperature.

2. The furnace as defined in claim 1 , wherein the user interface enables a selection of zones of the plurality of zones for inclusion in a subset of zones of the plurality of zones for modification.

3. The furnace as defined in claim 2 , wherein the user interface enables a selection of a predetermined subset of the plurality of zones as the subset of zones of the plurality of zones for modification.

4. The furnace as defined in claim 2 , wherein the user interface enables selection and deselection of individual ones of the plurality of zones for inclusion in the subset of zones of the plurality of zones for modification.

5. The furnace as defined in claim 1 , wherein the control circuitry is configured to, in response to receiving an input via the user interface, increment or decrement a respective temperature setpoint for each zone of the plurality of zones included in a subset of zones of the plurality of zones for modification.

6. The furnace as defined in claim 1 , wherein the control circuitry is configured to select a subset of zones of the plurality of zones and increment or decrement a respective temperature setpoint for each zone of the plurality of zones included in the subset of zones based on a single input from the user interface.

7. The furnace as defined in claim 1 , wherein first zones of the plurality of zones are located on a first side of the one or more belts and second zones of the plurality of zones are located on a second side of the one or more belts.

8. The furnace as defined in claim 1 , wherein the user interface comprises at least one of a hardware button, a software button, a display screen and cursor, or a touchscreen.

9. The furnace as defined in claim 1 , wherein the plurality of zones correspond to respective volumes within a heating section of the furnace.

10. The furnace as defined in claim 1 , wherein the user interface is configured to indicate which zones of the plurality of zones are currently included in a subset of zones of the plurality of zones for modification.

11. The furnace as defined in claim 1 , wherein the user interface is configured to indicate at least one of a current temperature or a temperature setpoint for each zone of the plurality of zones.

Assignees

• Illinois Tool Works

Inventors

• Ruf Daniel M
• Ball Roy

Classifications

• H10P72/0434

  mainly by convection · CPC title

• F27B17/00

  Furnaces of a kind not covered by any of groups F27B1/00 - F27B15/00 (structural combinations of furnaces F27B19/02) · CPC title

• H05B3/0047

  for semiconductor manufacture · CPC title

• H05B6/06

  Control, e.g. of temperature, of power · CPC title

• Y02E10/50

  Photovoltaic [PV] energy · CPC title