CN214193438U

CN214193438U - Magnetron sputtering coating device and system

Info

Publication number: CN214193438U
Application number: CN202022957486.1U
Authority: CN
Inventors: 黄涛; 刘佳明; 王鹏程; 刘顺明; 谭彪; 马永胜
Original assignee: Institute of High Energy Physics of CAS; Spallation Neutron Source Science Center
Current assignee: Institute of High Energy Physics of CAS; Spallation Neutron Source Science Center
Priority date: 2020-12-09
Filing date: 2020-12-09
Publication date: 2021-09-14
Anticipated expiration: 2030-12-09

Abstract

A magnetron sputtering coating device and a system are provided, wherein the magnetron sputtering coating device comprises a lifting driving mechanism and a coating mechanism, and the coating mechanism comprises a solenoid used for coating a pipeline. The solenoid is arranged in a structure capable of moving along the axial direction of the pipeline to be coated, and moves in the axial direction along with the magnetic field, so that the segmented or continuous coating of the pipeline is realized, and the magnetron sputtering coating system can be applied to the sputtering coating of the pipeline, particularly a longer pipeline.

Description

Magnetron sputtering coating device and system

Technical Field

The invention relates to the technical field of magnetic sputtering, in particular to a magnetron sputtering coating device and system.

Background

The current commonly used process for coating the film on the inner wall of the pipeline is to carry out magnetron sputtering coating, and the basic principle is to change the movement direction of electrons through a magnetic field parallel to a cathode, restrict and prolong the movement track of the electrons, thereby improving the ionization probability of the electrons to working gas and effectively utilizing the energy of the electrons; electrons bombard the argon atoms with a sufficient number of positively charged argon ions, thus forming an abnormal glow discharge of a high density plasma; in glow discharge, argon positive ions bombard the cathode target to cause sputtering of the target, and under the action of an electromagnetic field, the argon ions impact the cathode target wire to deposit the cathode material on the inner wall of the pipeline.

In the coating process, the generation range of the magnetic field is generally determined according to the length of a coated pipeline. For the coating process of long pipelines, long solenoids are needed to generate magnetic fields, namely, the length of the corresponding solenoid is more than or equal to that of the vacuum pipeline. In the technical field, solenoid coils within 2 meters can be wound and manufactured by relevant equipment; for the solenoid with the length of more than 2 meters, related winding equipment is basically not available, so that the problem of too short length of the solenoid is solved by generally adopting a mode of connecting a plurality of solenoids end to end in series. The solenoid with enough length can be obtained by connecting a plurality of solenoids in series, and the solenoid can be used for coating a long pipeline; the complexity of the system increases accordingly, each solenoid needs to be equipped with a corresponding power supply and water cooling device; and the system cost is high.

Disclosure of Invention

The invention provides a magnetron sputtering coating device and system, which are used for coating the inner part of a pipeline with a longer distance.

In a first aspect, the present application provides a magnetron sputtering coating device, which includes a lifting driving mechanism and a coating mechanism for coating a pipe. The coating mechanism comprises a solenoid coil which moves on the outer wall of the pipeline and a cathode sputtering target wire which extends into the pipeline; the lifting driving mechanism drives the solenoid to move along the axis direction of the pipeline, the solenoid generates a magnetic field at the pipeline, and the cathode sputtering target wire performs sputtering coating on the inner wall of the pipeline under the action of the magnetic field.

In one embodiment, the magnetron sputtering coating device further comprises a base and a support frame fixed on the base; the supporting frame is provided with a pipeline fixing upper end and a pipeline fixing lower end which are used for sealing and fixing two ends of a pipeline in the vertical direction.

In one embodiment, the bottom of the fixed upper end of the pipeline is connected with an electrode lead-in connector for externally connecting a cathode power supply, and the cathode sputtering target wire is connected with the electrode lead-in connector.

In one embodiment, the bottom of the cathode sputtering target wire is also connected with a heavy hammer for keeping the cathode sputtering target wire vertical.

In one embodiment, the fixed upper end of the tube has a sputtering gas inlet for filling the interior of the tube with a sputtering gas, such as Ar gas or the like.

In one embodiment, the fixed lower end of the pipeline is provided with a vacuum pumping port for connecting the external vacuum pumping assembly and pumping vacuum to the interior of the pipeline.

In one embodiment, the lifting driving mechanism comprises a screw rod arranged in parallel with the pipeline, and a solenoid fixing support for bearing the solenoid is arranged on the screw rod; and under the rotation of the screw rod, the solenoid fixing support is driven to move along the axis direction of the screw rod, so that the solenoid is driven to move on the pipeline.

In one embodiment, the lifting driving mechanism further comprises a control motor for controlling the screw rod to rotate.

In one embodiment, the device further comprises a speed reducer for controlling the rotation speed of the screw rod.

In one embodiment, the length of the solenoid is less than the length of the conduit.

In a second aspect, the present application further provides a magnetron sputtering coating system, which includes a magnetron sputtering coating apparatus, and further includes a vacuum pumping assembly, an Ar gas storage apparatus, and a cathode power supply.

Specifically, the magnetron sputtering coating device in the system comprises: the lifting driving mechanism and the film coating mechanism are used for coating the pipeline. The coating mechanism comprises a solenoid coil which moves on the outer wall of the pipeline and a cathode sputtering target wire which extends into the pipeline; the lifting driving mechanism drives the solenoid to move along the axis direction of the pipeline, the solenoid generates a magnetic field at the pipeline, and the cathode sputtering target wire performs sputtering coating on the inner wall of the pipeline under the action of the magnetic field.

In one embodiment, the magnetron sputtering coating device further comprises a base and a support frame fixed on the base; the supporting frame is provided with a pipeline fixing upper end and a pipeline fixing lower end which are used for sealing and fixing the pipeline in the vertical direction.

In one embodiment, the fixed upper end of the tube has a sputtering gas inlet for filling the interior of the tube with a sputtering gas, such as Ar gas.

According to the first aspect, the solenoid is arranged in a structure capable of moving along the axial direction of the pipeline to be coated, and the solenoid can movably generate a magnetic field on the pipeline to realize the sectional coating of the pipeline, so that the magnetron sputtering coating system can be applied to the sputtering coating of the pipeline, particularly a longer pipeline.

According to the second aspect, since the solenoid movable along the outer wall of the pipe is used to generate the magnetic field required for coating the system, the coating of the pipe can be completed without increasing the complexity of the system.

Drawings

FIG. 1 is a schematic structural diagram of a magnetron sputtering coating device according to the present application;

FIG. 2 is a cross-sectional view taken at B-B of FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is a schematic view showing the movement of a solenoid in a sectional coating mode according to an embodiment;

FIG. 4 is a schematic view showing the movement of a solenoid in a two-round continuous coating method according to an embodiment.

Labeling: the sputtering device comprises a base 10, a support frame 20, a pipeline fixing upper end 30, a sputtering gas inlet 31, an electrode introducing joint 32, a pipeline fixing lower end 40, a vacuum pumping hole 41, a solenoid 50, a cathode sputtering target wire 51, a heavy hammer 52, a screw rod 60, a solenoid fixing support 61, a pipeline 70, a speed reducer 80 and a control motor 90.

Detailed Description

The present invention will be described in further detail with reference to the following detailed description and accompanying drawings. Wherein like elements in different embodiments are numbered with like associated elements. In the following description, numerous details are set forth in order to provide a better understanding of the present application. However, those skilled in the art will readily recognize that some of the features may be omitted or replaced with other elements, materials, methods in different instances. In some instances, certain operations related to the present application have not been shown or described in detail in order to avoid obscuring the core of the present application from excessive description, and it is not necessary for those skilled in the art to describe these operations in detail, so that they may be fully understood from the description in the specification and the general knowledge in the art.

Furthermore, the features, operations, or characteristics described in the specification may be combined in any suitable manner to form various embodiments. Also, the various steps or actions in the method descriptions may be transposed or transposed in order, as will be apparent to one of ordinary skill in the art. Thus, the various sequences in the specification and drawings are for the purpose of describing certain embodiments only and are not intended to imply a required sequence unless otherwise indicated where such sequence must be followed.

The application provides a magnetron sputtering coating device for coating film to pipeline inner wall, moves along the axis direction of pipeline through a shorter solenoid, realizes evenly coating film or segmentation coating film to reciprocating of pipeline. The present application is particularly applicable to the coating of relatively long pipes, which are relatively long with respect to the solenoid, i.e. in the present application the length of the solenoid is less than the length of the pipe, to enable the solenoid to be movable along the outer wall of the pipe. In this application, a pipe is particularly a pipe which is too long to be coated by a conventional coating device, for example, for a pipe 5 m and 10 m long, it is only necessary to coat by a 50cm or other small-sized solenoid without increasing the length of the solenoid.

As shown in fig. 1-2, the magnetron sputtering coating device provided by the present application includes a coating mechanism and a lifting driving mechanism, and the lifting driving mechanism drives the coating mechanism to move along the outer wall of the pipeline, so as to coat the pipeline. The principle of magnetron sputtering coating is as follows: the electron motion direction is changed by the magnetic field parallel to the cathode, and the motion trail of electrons is restrained and prolonged, so that the ionization probability of the electrons to the working gas is improved, and the energy of the electrons is effectively utilized; electron bombardment of working gas such as argon ion to form abnormal glow discharge of high-density plasma; in glow discharge, argon positive ions bombard a cathode sputtering target wire to cause sputtering of a target material, and atoms sputtered out under the action of an electric field are deposited on the inner wall of a coated pipeline. Under the action of the electromagnetic field, the working gas (Ar gas) collides with the cathode sputtering target wire to deposit the cathode sputtering target wire on the inner wall of the pipeline.

Specifically, the coating mechanism comprises a solenoid 50 which is movably arranged on the outer wall of the pipeline 70, and a cathode sputtering target wire 51 which extends into the pipeline 70, wherein one end of the coated pipeline 70 is grounded. The solenoid 50 in this application refers to a solenoid magnet that provides a magnetic field parallel to the pipe 70 during the coating process; the cathode sputtering target wire 51 is also called cathode target, target material, cathode wire, and is a coating material. The solenoid 50 moves along the axial direction of the pipeline and generates a magnetic field under the driving of the lifting driving mechanism, and the cathode sputtering target wire 51 performs sputtering coating on the inner wall of the pipeline under the action of the magnetic field. Namely, under the action of a magnetic field, a negative potential is applied to the cathode sputtering target wire 51 through a cathode power supply, so that a potential difference can be formed between the cathode sputtering target wire 51 and the pipeline 70, thereby meeting the condition of coating, enabling the metal on the cathode sputtering target wire to be sputtered to the inner wall of the pipeline, and completing the process of coating the pipeline.

In one embodiment, the magnetron sputtering coating device further comprises a base 10 and a support 20 fixed on the base 10. The supporting frame 20 is used to facilitate the installation of the coating mechanism and the lifting driving mechanism, so that the base 10 and the supporting frame 20 may be any structure that can satisfy the installation of the above mechanisms. For example, the base may be a base having a horizontal installation surface on which the support frame is installed, and a rectangular parallelepiped frame in which a main body of the support frame is vertically placed may suffice for installing a long pipe.

In a more specific embodiment, the support bracket 20 is provided with a pipe-securing upper end 30 and a pipe-securing lower end 40 in a vertical direction for sealingly securing a pipe 70. That is, the pipeline is vertically disposed on the supporting frame, and both ends are sealed, so that the inside of the pipeline 70 is sealed. Further, the pipe 70 is detachably connected to the pipe fixing upper end 30 and the pipe fixing lower end 40, and for example, the pipe may be fixed by screwing or fitting of a snap-fit socket.

When installing the pipeline, the solenoid 50 is moved to the top of the pipeline fixing upper end 30 or the bottom of the pipeline fixing lower end 40, which is separated from the movement track in normal operation; the pipe 70 is pushed into the pipe fixing upper end 30 and the pipe fixing lower end 40 from the side, and the pipe fixing step such as screwing is performed. After the installation is completed, the solenoid 50 is moved back to the pipe 70, the pipe 70 is penetrated through the solenoid 50, and the solenoid 50 can move on the outer wall of the pipe 70 along the axial direction, so that the magnetic field can be generated at different positions in the pipe at different periods, and the coating of the pipe, especially the long pipe, can be realized.

After the interior of the pipe 70 is sealed, it needs to be vacuumized and filled with sputtering gas to satisfy the conditions of sputtering coating. It is therefore necessary to provide the vacuum pumping port 41 and the sputtering gas inlet port 31. In one embodiment, a vacuum pumping port 41 is provided at the fixed lower end 40 of the tube for externally connecting a vacuum pumping assembly and for pumping vacuum to the interior of the tube, and a sputtering gas inlet port 31 is provided at the fixed upper end 30 of the tube for filling the interior of the tube with sputtering gas. The arrangement position relationship here is only for example, and in practical application, a sputtering gas inlet may be arranged at the fixed lower end of the pipeline, and a vacuum pumping port may be arranged at the fixed upper end of the pipeline; or, a sputtering gas inlet and a vacuum pumping port are simultaneously arranged at the fixed lower end of the pipeline, or, a sputtering gas inlet and a vacuum pumping port are simultaneously arranged at the fixed upper end of the pipeline.

When the cathode sputtering target wire 51 is used for sputter coating the inside of the pipe 70, it is necessary to keep the inside of the pipe in an insulated state, that is, the cathode sputtering target wire 51 does not contact the inner wall of the pipe to be coated during the coating process. Thus, in one embodiment, tube 70 is vertically oriented and cathode sputter target wire 51 extends vertically into tube 70, with both the cathode sputter target wire and the tube being perpendicular to the ground and horizontally oriented therebetween. Further, a weight 52 for keeping the cathode sputtering target wire 51 vertical is connected to the bottom of the cathode sputtering target wire 51 to ensure that the cathode sputtering target wire 51 does not contact the pipeline during the magnetron sputtering process. Preferably, the cathode sputtering target filament extends into the interior of the tube and is located at an axial center of the tube. In other embodiments, the tube may be horizontal or inclined, so long as it is horizontally oriented with the cathode sputtering target wire.

Since the cathode power supply is required to be supplied to the cathode sputtering target wire 51 during sputtering, an electrode lead-in connector 32 for connecting the cathode power supply is connected to the bottom of the fixed upper end of the pipe 70, and the cathode sputtering target wire 51 is connected to the electrode lead-in connector 32. That is, one end of the electrode lead-in connector 32 is connected to a cathode power supply, and the other end is connected to the cathode sputtering target wire 51, and an electric field necessary for plating is applied to the cathode sputtering target wire 51 during plating.

In one embodiment, the lifting driving mechanism includes a screw rod 60 disposed parallel to the pipeline, and a solenoid fixing bracket 61 for carrying the solenoid 50 is disposed on the screw rod 60. The screw 60 functions to provide a driving force for the movement of the solenoid while defining the movement locus of the solenoid 50. The lead screw in this embodiment adopts the working principle of a ball screw, that is, under the rotation of the lead screw 60, the solenoid fixing bracket 61 is driven to move horizontally along the axial direction of the lead screw, so as to drive the solenoid 50 to move on the pipeline along the axial direction. In other embodiments, the lifting mechanism in the lifting driving mechanism may also adopt other structures, such as but not limited to a gear transmission mechanism, a synchronous belt transmission mechanism, a synchronous chain transmission mechanism, a crank block mechanism, a lead screw and nut mechanism, etc.; as long as it can drive the solenoid to move on the pipeline along the axial direction.

The lift drive mechanism further includes a control motor 90 for controlling the rotation of the lead screw. In one embodiment, the control motor is used as a power source, and may be embodied as a stepping motor. In other embodiments, other structures capable of outputting rotational motion may be adopted, for example, a linear motion power source such as an air cylinder, an oil cylinder, a linear motor, etc. is used in conjunction with a transmission mechanism. Preferably, the lifting driving mechanism further comprises a speed reducer 80 for controlling the rotation speed of the screw rod, and since the output rotation speed of the control motor 90 is relatively high, the speed reducer 80 is adopted to reduce the speed thereof so as to increase the torsion, and the speed of the solenoid 50 is adjusted, so as to better realize film coating.

In the embodiment of the present application, the length of the solenoid 50 should be less than the length of the pipe 70, so that the solenoid 50 can move axially along the outer wall of the pipe 70, thereby intermittently generating a magnetic field inside the whole pipe 70, and realizing magnetron sputtering coating. The mode of intermittently generating the magnetic field comprises gentle continuous movement, namely moving along the axial direction of the pipeline at a uniform speed to generate the magnetic field; or segmented movement, i.e. moving to each zone to generate a magnetic field, based on the length of the magnetic field generated by the solenoid on the pipe, dividing it into different zones.

The technical solution of the present application is further illustrated by the following specific examples.

Example one

The embodiment adopts a sectional coating mode to work:

the pipeline is equally divided into a plurality of areas with the same working length as the solenoids along the axis direction, the solenoids sequentially carry out magnetic sputtering along different areas on the pipeline, and after the film coating in one area is finished, the pipeline is moved to another area to carry out the film coating again, so that the sectional film coating of the pipeline is realized. As shown in fig. 3, the pipe is divided into a zone 1, a zone 2 and a zone 3 in the axial direction, and the solenoid is sequentially coated on the zones in a stepwise manner, for example, the solenoid may be sequentially coated in the order of the zone 1, the zone 2 and the zone 3, or sequentially coated in the order of the zone 3, the zone 2 and the zone 1. The number of zone divisions of the conduit may be determined by the ratio between the length of the conduit and the length of the solenoid, each zone being of equal length to the length of the solenoid.

In this embodiment, when the solenoid is used for coating in one area each time, the inner wall of the pipeline in the area can be completely coated with a layer of film, namely, the pipeline with a longer distance is divided into different areas to sequentially realize the sectional coating.

The thickness of the coating can be determined by the time of solenoid sputtering and the number of times the zone is operated. The thicker the thickness, the longer the sputtering time, or the more the number of operations in the region, and for example, after sputtering is sequentially performed for each region, the sputtering operation may be repeated by returning to the initial region, or the sputtering operation may be repeated sequentially from the end region to the initial region.

In order to make the thickness of the coating film uniform, the stay time of the solenoid in each area can be controlled to be consistent. To achieve complete coating of the inner wall of the tube in each zone with a thin film, the tube may be divided according to the length of the solenoid active zone to ensure that the sputtered cathode material in the solenoid active zone is deposited in and completely covers one of the zones of the tube at a time. In order to prevent the film from being uneven due to the fact that the film is too thick at the connecting position of the sections of the areas, a certain distance can be reserved between the positions coated twice, and the length of the solenoid working area can be slightly smaller than that of each area.

Example two

The embodiment adopts a reciprocating continuous coating mode to work: the solenoid reciprocates along the axis of the pipe over its length as shown in figure 4 to effect coating of the pipe. As the solenoid is reciprocated, the magnetic field is also moved, which causes fluctuation of the discharge plasma, so that it is necessary to reasonably control the moving speed of the solenoid.

In this embodiment, the solenoid may move from the initial position to the end position at a predetermined speed while the pipe is coated, and after one coating is completed, the solenoid may move from the end position to the initial position while the pipe is coated, or after one coating is completed, the solenoid may directly return to the initial position and the pipe may be coated again from the initial position to the end position. The control of the thickness of the film can be realized by controlling the coating times.

The application also provides a magnetic control lifting coating system, which comprises the solenoid lifting coating device, a cathode power supply, an Ar gas storage device and the like, and the specific implementation process is referred to in the foregoing, and is not described herein again.

To sum up, this application solenoid lift coating film device can realize carrying out the coating film to the pipeline of arbitrary length through adopting shorter solenoid, is particularly useful for the coating film to the pipeline. Meanwhile, the structure of up-down moving and lifting is adopted, so that the solenoid can be miniaturized and integrated, and the production cost of the whole coating system can be reduced.

The present invention has been described in terms of specific examples, which are provided to aid understanding of the invention and are not intended to be limiting. For a person skilled in the art to which the invention pertains, several simple deductions, modifications or substitutions may be made according to the idea of the invention.

Claims

1. A magnetron sputtering coating device is used for coating a pipeline and is characterized by comprising a lifting driving mechanism and a coating mechanism; the coating mechanism comprises a solenoid which is movably arranged on the outer wall of the pipeline, a cathode sputtering target wire which extends into the pipeline, and a cathode power supply which provides an electric field for the cathode sputtering target wire; the solenoid moves along the axis direction of the pipeline and generates a magnetic field under the driving of the lifting driving mechanism, and the cathode sputtering target wire performs sputtering coating on the inner wall of the pipeline under the action of the electric field and the magnetic field.

2. The magnetron sputtering coating device according to claim 1, further comprising a base and a support fixed to the base; the supporting frame is provided with a pipeline fixing upper end and a pipeline fixing lower end which are used for sealing and fixing two ends of a pipeline in the vertical direction respectively.

3. The magnetron sputtering coating apparatus according to claim 2, wherein said fixed upper end of said tube has an electrode lead-in connector, and said cathode sputtering target wire is connected to said cathode power supply through said electrode lead-in connector.

4. The magnetron sputtering coating apparatus according to claim 3, wherein a weight for keeping the cathode sputtering target wire vertical is further attached to the bottom of the cathode sputtering target wire.

5. The magnetron sputtering coating apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the fixed lower end of the pipe has a vacuum pumping port for externally connecting a vacuum pumping assembly and for pumping vacuum to the inside of the pipe.

6. The magnetron sputter coating apparatus as recited in claim 5 wherein said fixed upper end of said tube has a sputtering gas inlet port for filling the interior of said tube with sputtering gas.

7. The magnetron sputtering coating device according to claim 1, wherein the elevating drive mechanism comprises a screw rod arranged in parallel with the pipeline, and a solenoid fixing support for carrying the solenoid is arranged on the screw rod; the solenoid fixing support moves along the axis direction of the screw rod under the rotation of the screw rod, and drives the solenoid to move stably in the axis direction of the pipeline.

8. The magnetron sputtering coating device according to claim 7, wherein the elevating drive mechanism further comprises a control motor for controlling the rotation of the lead screw, and a speed reducer for controlling the rotation speed of the lead screw.

9. The magnetron sputter coating apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 8, wherein the length of said solenoid is less than the length of the pipe.

10. A magnetron sputter coating system comprising a magnetron sputter coating apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 8.