A New Family of Roll to Roll Sputter Web Coaters Designed for TCO and Low Emissivity Coatings

摘要

We will present a newly developed sputtering tool for roll to roll web coating of substrates up to 1600 mm width. The machine was designed for the use of up to ten rotary sputtering cathodes with DC or MF power supplies. The rotary cathodes enable a long target life combined with high deposition rate and low arc rates even in fully reactive processes such as silicon dioxide. The winding system is installed on a trolley which is located on rails and can be moved out of the vacuum chamber for easy substrate exchange. The rotary cathodes are located on a second trolley which can be moved out to the other side allowing easy access to the sputtering targets. The system is equipped with turbomolecular pumps and cold traps for fast pump down and excellent base vacuum pressure. The substrate temperature can be controlled with heaters and a temperature controlled coating drum. Electrical and optical inline measurement tools and a substrate pre-treatment are available as an option. The system is very versatile and can be used for various applications such as touch panels, low emissivity coatings etc.. Planar cathodes are available as an option for special materials which are not available in rotary targets.