Comparative Study of the Stress in Chromium Films Deposited by Vacuum Arc Evaporation, Vacuum Evaporation, and DC Magnetron Sputtering

Abstract

Chromium layers have been deposited by three PVD techniques — vacuum arc evaporation, vacuum evaporation, and dc magnetron sputtering - at substrate temperatures up to 500°C. The samples have been subjected to stress detection by analysis of the stress-induced sample bending, some of them by X-ray stress analysis, too. The subject of the investigations is the explanation of the dependence of the intrinsic film stress on the substrate temperature for each method, and a comparison of the obtained results. The most important difference between the deposition techniques is the average energy of the layer forming species. It is shown that there is a clear correspondence between these energies and the difference in the stress evolution in dependence on the substrate temperature for the different deposition techniques.