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Spectroscopic characterization of nanocrystalline diamond

N. WOEHRL1,* , V. BUCK1

Affiliation

  1. Division of Thin Film Technology, Department of Physics, University of Duisburg-Essen, 47048 Duisburg, Germany

Abstract

Diamond films are of interest for many tribological applications because of the outstanding combination of favourable properties like highest hardness, low coefficient of friction, high wear resistance, high thermal conductivity, and chemical inertness. The development of low pressure synthesis for diamond films on nondiamond substrates was responsible for the rapid growth of diamond coating technology for several applications and many different chemical vapour deposition (CVD) processes for the production of thin diamond films have been developed; especially the development of nanocrystalline diamond films that are aditionally tough and smooth opened a new area. But it has been proven difficult to coat technically important substrates like ceramics, steels, nickel alloys, cemented carbides, and most alloys containing transition metals with well-adherent, high quality diamond films. However, diamond coatings with good adhesion and wear resistance are necessary to realize the full potential of cutting tools or abrasive applications and to get a good performance in machining of advanced materials. Apart from several other aspects, problems due to the difference in thermal expansion coefficients of diamond and the substrate and intrinsic mechanical stresses due to the growth process of diamond films have to be solved. It is shown here how these problems can be solved by careful adjustment of the process parameters determining film structure and thus mechanical stress; especially it is shown that mechanical stress can be determined quantitavely by non destructive spectroscopic methods that allow quality assurance even on substrates with complicated shape (“3Dsubstrates”) like tools..

Keywords

Nanocrystalline diamond films, Residual stress.

Submitted at: Sept. 1, 2008
Accepted at: Nov. 11, 2008

Citation

N. WOEHRL, V. BUCK, Spectroscopic characterization of nanocrystalline diamond, Journal of Optoelectronics and Advanced Materials Vol. 10, Iss. 11, pp. 2819-2826 (2008)