1 DP 41

Polishers of this class are precision material-removal tools used to produce flat, smooth, and undamaged surfaces on rigid workpieces. A machine in this category typically supports development work, sample preparation, and small-scale finishing of technical materials.

Polishing machines of this type rotate a flat platen beneath a workpiece. The workpiece is held in a carrier and pressed against the platen under a controlled load. Polishing slurry is fed onto the platen to supply abrasives and process fluid. Plate speed, force, and slurry chemistry together determine the material-removal rate.

In chemical-mechanical polishing, the fluid contains chemical reagents as well as abrasive particles. Surface layers are chemically modified and then mechanically worn away, yielding a planar surface. The platen must remain flat and conditioned, since the shape of the plate is transferred to the workpiece.

The machine operates at the final material-removal stage of a process sequence. Workpieces reach a polisher of this kind after sawing, grinding, or lapping has established an initial flat shape. The polishing step removes the subsurface damage left by earlier abrasive operations. Polished parts normally proceed to cleaning before further processing or inspection.

Applications include preparing semiconductor wafers for fabrication, thinning electronic substrates, and producing metallographic or crystallographic cross-sections for microscopy. The same class of machine finishes ceramics, glass, optical components, and other brittle materials.