Product Description

Deposition Chamber

The HFCVD Deposition Chamber is a spherical 12” diameter electro-polished double walled water cooled chamber. HFCVD’s chamber body is fabricated from 304 stainless steel hemisphere with double wall for water cooling. The spherical chamber is bakeable up to 150°C if fitted with copper gaskets. Blue Wave’s chamber is capable of reaching ultra-high vacuum (UHV) levels if appropriate pumping system is used. The vacuum chamber has been leak-tested to at least 10-8 mbar-L/sec He. This vacuum chamber contains multi ports with ConFlat flanges sealed with either Viton or copper gaskets. The ports are positioned in the front, back, sides, top, bottom, and radially. Ports can be either closed with stainless steel flanges or optical windows to have required number of optical windows. If selected, optional turbo pump vacuum levels can reach pressures more adept that 10E-6 Torr. The chamber has well positioned and sized ports for sample loading, unloading, and sample viewing and in-situ metrology.

Process Monitoring Pressure Gauge

System includes capacitance vacuum gauge and display for measuring vacuum and process pressure control. Blue Wave deposition tool utilizes pressure set-point interlock for over pressure safety protection.

Filament Holder and Tensioning The filament holder it fitter with filament array geometry for easy loading and filament changing. In addition, the horizontal filament holder flange is mounted with moly and copper feed-through and connectors, and an 8” Conflat flange on top. The moly filament mounting holder has easy access for replacement of tungsten filaments. There is a total of 12 filaments. The filament diameters vary from 0.25 to 0.5 mm. High Energy Density Filament Power Supply The lower supply (6kW) is capable of powering filaments to reach temperature of up to 2500C in the CVD process pressures. Filament Temperature Temperatures can reach a maximum 2500°C using low voltage and high current DC power supply. Process Gas Flow Meters 3 MFCs for H2 (500sccm), Argon (500sccm), and CH4 (10sccm) or user selected gas/flow designed to control gas flows in a wide variety of applications and available with full-scale flow ranges from 10 sccm up to 500 sccm calibrated for specific gases. Each MFC has an electronic knob and digital display to control gas flow and is / calibrated for selected gas input (“gas with correction factor). All MFCs are constructed with gas shut-off valves for over pressure safety shut off. All flow controls are manual using high precision turning knobs.

Linear motion z- stage for controlling sample to filament distance

Linear motion z- stage is motorized to adjust in-situ position of filament to substrate distance (2” range) while substrate is in vacuum or in the process of deposition. This stage allows sample to filament distance adjustment “in-situ”, in vacuum or in any process pressure, and during filaments ON or OFF. The linear movement is with accuracy of 1.0 mm or better. Proper scale/monitoring of the position will be incorporated externally near the motorized part attached to the stainless steel flexible bellow. Linear movement will be always maintaining parallelism between the heater surface and the bottom CF flange. Limit switches are design to limit the scope of travel.

Substrate Rotation

Substrate can be rotated at 10rpm max. for highly uniform deposition.

Substrate Heater

2″ diameter up to 800°C max temperature adjustable with closed loop controller and thermal couple fully capable for carbon CVD diamond processes. Versatile closed –loop substrate heater (temperature max 850°C and temperature non-uniformity across the wafer within 2-5%), Eurotherm 8 segment process programmable Power Supply, with active temperature controller cables, K-type thermocouple and connectors.

Process Gas MFC Control

Course/fine manual flow rate setting and on/off valve.

Vacuum Control

Capacitance vacuum gauge for process pressure monitoring.

Process Valve Control

Manual control with course and fine adjustments for precise pressure control.

Vacuum Pump

Mechanical rotary vane oil pump, base pressure better than 5-10×10-3 Torr.

Equipment Frame

Sturdy construction with steel with 19″ rack mount construction.

System Options

1. Two Color IR Pyrometer for Filament Temperature Measurement

IR-2C: The Two-color IR pyrometer for filament temperature monitoring through optical fiber uses a bright LED digital display It is a state-of-the-art instrument for difficult and demanding high temperature (up to 3000°C) applications. The device is ideally suited for measuring HFCVD filament temperature very precisely. It is extremely fast and accurate with a response time of 10 msec and accuracy of 0.2% of full scale. The IR-2C is designed and manufactured in the USA to the highest quality standards backed by a 5 year extended warranty for this part.

2. Additional MFC

MKS brand Mass Flow Controllers of various ranges are supplied. Additional MFC for doping or Nanodiamond coating synthesis using Ar gas is an additional accessory.

3. Load-lock chamber with gate valve for in-situ wafer transfer while running filaments or CVD Diamond process

The Blue Wave load-lock system with high vacuum turbo pump system is designed to manually load wafers or other flat substrates into HFCVD processing chamber. Samples can conveniently be transferred into the processing chamber without affecting process conditions while process is running. This is the most efficient way to extended life of the filaments in the HFCVD system. Sp2 content in the film can be reduced in the diamond films at the interface as the lock load feature allows carburization of filaments prior to transferring of the wafer into the processing chamber. Many wafers can be swapped while running HFCVD process, thus allowing for the efficient use of the system and yielding higher productivity in research. The Load-Lock is mounted with a gate valve attached to a main system chamber. A substrate can then be easily positioned through the large entry door onto the transfer stage in the load-lock chamber. After the load-lock chamber is evacuated to the desired vacuum level, and when the gate valve opened, the substrate can be transferred into the process chamber. This allows repeated substrate loading and unloading without breaking vacuum in the main chamber. It greatly reduces the process time and also saves filaments life significantly and maintains a cleaner chamber for critical process applications.

4. In-situ Laser Reflectivity for in-situ film growth thickness monitoring

In-situ thickness monitoring tool includes:

optical mounts on the chamber

laser with 632 wavelength

detector

filters

steering mirrors

electronics with LabView control and real time data acquisition program Thickness is calculated based on interference oscillations.

5. Lab View Control

LabView control on PC for remote operation and recipe development (by users). Process parameters controlled:

Gas flows

Chamber Pressure

Filament to substrate distance control

Substrate rotation

Heater temperature

DC power and filament temperature

*A PC with LabVIEW hardware and software will be provided.

6. Graphene Synthesis

Graphene synthesis uses specialized 1” substrate heater capable of reaching 1100C in H2/CH4. A gas environment is suitable for graphene synthesis on Ni and Cu.