Jan-Peter Urbach¹, Thomas Schütte¹, Holger Gerdes², Peter Neiß¹, Marius Radloff¹, Hokuto Kikuchi¹, Ralf Bandorf^2
1PLASUS GmbH, Mering, Germany
¹Fraunhofer Institute for Surface Engineering and Thin Films IST, Braunschweig, Germany
HIPIMS processes and other pulsed plasma processes are used more and more for coating applications in R&D and production. Understanding and controlling the behavior of particle densities in the pulse is essential to optimize the coating process further in terms of deposition rate, film composition, and morphology. This requires plasma monitoring and process control technologies which are capable to acquire pulse-resolved process data in real time.
The latest development of spectroscopic and electrical plasma monitoring and process control technology overcomes the restriction of only pulse-averaging data acquisition. Furthermore, it now provides pulse-resolved particle density information in real-time.
This presentation will demonstrate the continuous, pulse-resolved spectroscopic and electrical data acquisition with unprecedented time resolution and sampling rate in a multi-channel setup at reasonable expense. As the minimum integration time is much smaller than typical HIPIMS pulses the temporal behavior of particle densities as well as voltage and current within the pulse can be monitored in real-time. This capability helps to investigate and understand the particle dynamics in the HIPIMS pulse at different process parameters such as different pulse modes and patterns. In particular, the pulse resolved particle composition can be tracked, which allows to optimize the ionization degree and the metal to reactive gas ratio on the fly. This new technology provides new opportunities for R&D to tailor coatings with advanced or new properties and will enhance process stability and production quality in industrial application.