Characteristics of a small PIIID system using a cathodic arc built at INFIP

ADRIANA MÁRQUEZ; ARIEL KLEIMAN; ANDREA DEL VALLE; MARIANA FAZIO; HÉCTOR KELLY; DIEGO G LAMAS

Sao Jose dos Campos, SP, Brasil

Workshop; Plasma Based Ion Implantation and Deposition 2009; 2009

Plasma immersion ion implantation combined with deposition technique using cathodic arcs as plasma sources has demonstrated to be useful for the fabrication of dense plasma coatings with improved tribological and mechanical properties. Recently, a small plasma immersion ion implantation and deposition (PIIID) system for research purposes was built at INFIP. A dc cathodic arc with a Ti cathode of 5 cm in diameter and an annular anode of 8cm in diameter was employed as the plasma source. The substrate chamber was electrically insulated and connected with the main discharge chamber through a straight magnetic duct. The discharge current was 100 A. The substrate was biased with a pulsed generator (20 kV, 50 A, 0.050- 3 kHz) based on a pulse transformer controlled by IGBT switches. In this work the generator was operated at low frequency, and with pulse duration and amplitude of 10 ms and 5 kV, respectively. Preliminary results on this treatment applied to stainless steel substrates are presented.