Toward energy-efficient physical vapor deposition: Routes for replacing substrate heating during magnetron sputter deposition by employing metal ion irradiation

Li, X.; Bakhit, Babak; Johansson-Jöesaar, Mats P.; Hultman, Lars; Petrov, I.; Greczyński, Grzegorz

doi:10.1016/j.surfcoat.2021.127120

Cited by 31 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 39 publications

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“…Depositions of (Ti 1- y Al y ) 1- x W x N films are performed in an industrial CC800/9 magnetron sputtering system from CemeCon AG (Würselen, Germany) using a hybrid W-HiPIMS/TiAl-DCMS scheme, with a pulsed W + -flux provided by the W target operated in HiPIMS mode while Ti + - and Al + -fluxes are generated by two TiAl DC targets symmetrically placed on both sides of the W target 20 , 21 . TiAl DC targets are composed of Ti plates (Ti > 99 wt%) with 15 mm diameter Al plugs (Al > 99 wt%) distributed along the racetrack.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A calibrated thermocouple placed near the center of the stationary substrates is used to measure the temperature during the entire process, as shown in the schematic diagram of the deposition system in Ref. 20 . Two resistance heaters placed symmetrically on the front and back sides of the chamber produce heat for degassing the chamber before deposition, so that the base pressure reaches 0.3 mPa (2.25 × 10 –6 Torr).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The high quality of these layers was confirmed by the application studies in which Ti 1- x Ta x N layers performed exceptionally well as Cu diffusion barriers on Si (001) 18 and provided excellent corrosion protection for stainless-steel substrates 19 . Systematic studies of densification effects induced by group VIB transition metal (TM) target ions in Ti 0.50 Al 0.50 N demonstrated that the densification effects scale with the mass of HiPIMS-generated metal-ions 20 . (Ti 1- y Al y ) 1- x W x N films were dense even with the lowest W concentration, x = 0.09, showed no evidence of hexagonal wurtzite AlN precipitation, and exhibit state-of the-art mechanical properties typical of Ti 0.50 Al 0.50 N grown at 500 °C.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Dense, single-phase, hard, and stress-free Ti0.32Al0.63W0.05N films grown by magnetron sputtering with dramatically reduced energy consumption

Bakhit

Johansson-Jöesaar³

et al. 2022

Sci Rep

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The quest for lowering energy consumption during thin film growth, as by magnetron sputtering, becomes of particular importance in view of sustainable development goals. A recently proposed solution combining high power impulse and direct current magnetron sputtering (HiPIMS/DCMS) relies on the use of heavy metal-ion irradiation, instead of conventionally employed resistive heating, to provide sufficient adatom mobility, in order to obtain high-quality dense films. The major fraction of process energy is used at the sputtering sources rather than for heating the entire vacuum vessel. The present study aims to investigate the W+ densification effects as a function of increasing Al content in (Ti1-yAly)1-xWxN films covering the entire range up to the practical solubility limits (y ~ 0.67). Layers with high Al content are attractive to industrial applications as the high temperature oxidation resistance increases with increasing Al concentration. The challenge is, however, to avoid precipitation of the hexagonal wurtzite AlN phase, which is softer. We report here that (Ti1-yAly)1-xWxN layers with y = 0.66 and x = 0.05 grown by a combination of W-HiPIMS and TiAl-DCMS with the substrate bias Vs synchronized to the W+-rich fluxes (to provide mobility in the absence of substrate heating) possess single-phase NaCl-structure, as confirmed by XRD and SAED patterns. The evidence provided by XTEM images and the residual oxygen content obtained from ERDA analyses reveals that the alloy films are dense without discernable porosity. The nanoindentation hardness is comparable to that of TiAlN films grown at 400–500 °C, while the residual stresses are very low. We established that the adatom mobility due to the heavy ion W+ irradiation (in place of resistive heating) enables the growth of high-quality coatings at substrate temperatures not exceeding 130 °C provided that the W+ momentum transfer per deposited metal atom is sufficiently high. The benefit of this novel film growth approach is not only the reduction of the process energy consumption by 83%, but also the possibility to coat temperature-sensitive substrates.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Dense, single-phase, hard, and stress-free Ti0.32Al0.63W0.05N films grown by magnetron sputtering with dramatically reduced energy consumption

Bakhit

Johansson-Jöesaar³

et al. 2022

Sci Rep

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…A pulsed substrate bias voltage of either − 120 or − 480 V were synchronized with the HiPIMS pulses. The two levels of bias voltage were used to alter the ion subplantation depth [21,[28][29][30]. Substrate bias was set with 30 μs delay after HiPIMS pulse ignition and 100 μs pulse length to capture the metal ion rich portion during the HiPIMS pulses, while growing films in the stationary configuration [22].…”

Section: Film Depositionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effects of substrate rotation during AlSi-HiPIMS/Ti-DCMS co-sputtering growth of TiAlSiN coatings on phase content, microstructure, and mechanical properties

Hsu

Greczyński

Christensen

et al. 2023

Surface and Coatings Technology

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“…The target to substrate distance determines the time delay between the magnetron and bias voltage pulses which is primarily investigated by mass spectroscopy. In general, this method has been demonstrated for static configurations, i.e., the target to substrate separation remains constant once the optimum time delay has been selected [2].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Selective Metal Ion Irradiation Using Bipolar HIPIMS: A New Route to Tailor Film Nanostructure and the Resulting Mechanical Properties

Fernández-Martínez¹,

Santiago²,

Méndez

et al. 2022

Coatings

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This manuscript introduces and experimentally demonstrates a novel concept of selective metal ion irradiation by combining bipolar HIPIMS with conventional DC magnetron sputtering operation and simple DC biasing. The addition of the positive pulse to a conventional HIPIMS discharge accelerates the predominantly metal ions created during the negative HIPIMS phase with an energy proportional to the positive pulse amplitude and ionization state. Two distinct metal elements with large difference in atomic mass (Cr and Nb) are used on this work to irradiate a TiAlN matrix which is being deposited by conventional DCMS. The positive acceleration voltages used for both Cr and Nb discharges were varied between 0 to +200 V to analyze the influence of Nb and Cr metal ion irradiation on the mechanical and microstructural properties of TiAlN films. Even though the total metal ion incorporation into the TiAlN matrix for both Cr and Nb is less than 10% at%, strong effects are observed on the resulting film properties. It was observed that use of the lighter metal ion Cr is more beneficial than the heavier metal ion Nb. The Cr bombardment allows a hardness improvement from 7 to 22 GPa as well as a reduced film accumulated stress at the highest positive acceleration voltage. From the XRD measurements it is observed that the Cr atoms are inserted into the TiAlN cubic matrix maintaining its crystalline structure. However, the bombardment with the high-mass metal ion (Nb) promotes the deformation of the cubic TiAlN matrix, resulting in a spinodal decomposition and further degradation of the crystalline structure with the appearance of the hexagonal wurtzite-type Al-rich phase. This is also translated to the resulting film mechanical properties, as hardness rapidly decreases from 25 to 10 GPa and stress increases linearly with the positive voltage acceleration.

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Toward energy-efficient physical vapor deposition: Routes for replacing substrate heating during magnetron sputter deposition by employing metal ion irradiation

Cited by 31 publications

References 39 publications

Dense, single-phase, hard, and stress-free Ti0.32Al0.63W0.05N films grown by magnetron sputtering with dramatically reduced energy consumption

Dense, single-phase, hard, and stress-free Ti0.32Al0.63W0.05N films grown by magnetron sputtering with dramatically reduced energy consumption

Effects of substrate rotation during AlSi-HiPIMS/Ti-DCMS co-sputtering growth of TiAlSiN coatings on phase content, microstructure, and mechanical properties

Selective Metal Ion Irradiation Using Bipolar HIPIMS: A New Route to Tailor Film Nanostructure and the Resulting Mechanical Properties

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