Superhard carbon film deposition by means of Laser-Arco® on the way from the Laboratory into the industrial series coating

Diamond-like carbon films (DLC) are more and more applied as wear protection coatings for components and tools due to their unique combination of high hardness, low friction and sticking tendency to metallic counter bodies. Up to now applied DLC films are hydrogen containing (a-C: H) or metal carbon films (Me-C: H) deposited by a plasma assisted CVD process from carbonhydrogen gas mixtures. Their wide industrial effort results from that the can be deposited with slowly modified coating machines for classical hard coating (e.g. TiN or CrN). A new generation DLC films are the hydrogen-free ta-C films (ta-C = tetrahedral bounded amorphous carbon) with a between two and three-times higher hardness and with a resulting higher wear resistance under extreme condition than classical DLC films. They have excellent emergency running properties at lubrication break down. Their industrial application is more difficult due to that they cannot deposited with modified coating machines for classical hard and DLC coating and a new technology with corresponding equipment was not available up to now. The laser controlled, pulsed arc deposition technology (Laser-Arco (R)) of the Fraunhofer IWS Dresden has this potential. In kind of a Laser-Arc-Module-source the ta-C film deposition can be integrated in every industrial used deposition machine.