Chemical Vapour Deposition (CVD)
Chemical Vapour Deposition (CVD)
Chemical Vapour Deposition (CVD)
Apparatus:
Working concept:
Types of chemical vapour deposition: a number of forms of CVD are in wide use.
These processes differ in the means by which chemical reactions are initiated (e.g.
activation process) and process conditions.
(a) Hot –wall CVD: the heating system heats up not only the wafer but the walls of
the reactor also.
(b) Cold-wall: the heating systems heats up wafer only.
Advantages of CVD
(a) Useful for coatings or freestanding structures of a wide range of metals and
ceramics.
(b) Can produce mesh or near-mesh intricate shapes.
(c) Gives high purity deposits (> 99.995% purity).
(d) Conform consistently to outline of substrate surface and internal passages with
high length to diameter ratios and coats powders also.
(e) Has neat theoretical as deposited density.
(f) Has controllable thickness and morphology and can concurrently coat several
apparatus.
(g) Forms alloys
(h) Creep into fiber performs and foam structures
Applications
(a) Evaporation: materials to be deposited as coating are taken in the form of target
and are bombarded by a high energy source (such as a beam of electrons or
ions or heating by a filament) in a vacuum chamber. The source material gets
heated and starts to boil and then evaporate.
(b) Transport: in transportation vaporized atoms from the target material move to
the substrate to be coated.
(c) Reaction: the transported atoms react with appropriate gas in transportation
stage.
(d) Deposition: here coating builds up on the substrate surface. Figure shows a
schematic diagram of the principles behind a common PVD method.
Advantage
(a) Almost any types of inorganic and organic material can be used.
(b) The process is more environmental friendly than processes such as
electroplating.
Disadvantages
Applications
(a) PVD coatings are generally used to improve hardness, wear resistance and
oxidation resistance.
(b) Coatings are useful in a wide range of applications such as aerospace,
automotive, surgical/ medical, dues and moulds for materials processing,
cutting tools and fire arms.