• Journal of the Korean institute of surface engineering
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• v.47 no.5
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• pp.263-268
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• 2014

Nanocrystalline diamond(NCD) coated SiC balls were applied in a ball-on-disk tribometer. After seeding in an ultrasonic bath containing nanometer diamond powders, $2.2{\mu}m$ thick NCD films were deposited on sintered 3 mm diameter SiC balls at $600^{\circ}C$ in a 2.45 GHz microwave plasma CVD system. Bare $ZrO_2$ and SiC balls were prepared for comparison as test balls. Tribology tests were performed in air with pairs of three different balls and mirror polished steel(SKH51) disk. The wear tracks on balls and disks were examined by optical microscope and alpha step profiler. Under the load of 3 N, the friction coefficients of steel against $ZrO_2$, SiC and NCD-coated balls were between 0.4 and 0.8. After a few thousands sliding laps, the friction coefficient of NCD-coated balls dropped from 0.45 to below 0.1 and maintained thereafter. Under a higher load of 10 N or 20 N with a long sliding distance of 2 km, $ZrO_2$ and SiC balls exhibited the similar friction coefficients as above. The friction coefficient of NCD-coated balls was less than 0.1 from the beginning and increased to above 0.1 steadily or with some fluctuations as sliding distance increased. NCD coating layers were found worn out after long duration and/or high load sliding test, which resulted in the friction coefficient higher than 0.1.

• Journal of the Korean institute of surface engineering
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• v.46 no.4
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• pp.145-152
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• 2013

The growth behavior of nanocrystalline diamond (NCD) film has been studied for three different substrates, i.e. bare Si wafer, 1 ${\mu}m$ thick W and Ti films deposited on Si wafer by DC sputter. The surface roughness values of the substrates measured by AFM were Si < W < Ti. After ultrasonic seeding treatment using nanometer sized diamond powder, surface roughness remained as Si < W < Ti. The contact angles of the substrates were Si ($56^{\circ}$) > W ($31^{\circ}$) > Ti ($0^{\circ}$). During deposition in the microwave plasma CVD system, NCD particles were formed and evolved to film. For the first 0.5h, the values of NCD particle density were measured as Si < W < Ti. Since the energy barrier for heterogeneous nucleation is proportional to the contact angle of the substrate, the initial nucleus or particle densities are believed to be Si < W < Ti. Meanwhile, the NCD growth rate up to 2 h was W > Si > Ti. In the case of W substrate, NCD particles were coalesced and evolved to the film in the short time of 0.5 h, which could be attributed to the fact that the diffusion of carbon species on W substrate was fast. The slower diffusion of carbon on Si substrate is believed to be the reason for slower film growth than on W substrate. The surface of Ti substrate was observed as a vertically aligned needle shape. The NCD particle formed on the top of a Ti needle should be coalesced with the particle on the nearby needle by carbon diffusion. In this case, the diffusion length is longer than that of Si or W substrate which shows a relatively flat surface. This results in a slow growth rate of NCD on Ti substrate. As deposition time is prolonged, NCD particles grow with carbon species attached from the plasma and coalesce with nearby particles, leaving many voids in NCD/Ti interface. The low adhesion of NCD films on Ti substrate is related to the void structure of NCD/Ti interface.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.36 no.10
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• pp.1189-1193
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• 2012

The Miniaturized Fingerprint Imager (MFI) is a slim optical mouse that can be used as an input device for application to wireless portable personnel communication devices such as smartphones. In this study, we have fabricated key optical components of an MFI, including the illumination optical components and imaging lens. An LED beam-shaping lens consisting of an aspheric lens and a Fresnel facet was successfully machined using a diamond turning machine (DTM). A customized V-shaped groove for beam path banding was fabricated by the bulk micromachining of silicon that was coated with aluminum using the shadow effect in thermal evaporation. The imaging lens and arrayed multilevel Fresnel lenses were fabricated by electron beam lithography and FAB etching, respectively. The proposed optical components are extremely compact and have high optical efficiency; therefore, they are applicable to ultraslim optical systems.

• Journal of the Korean institute of surface engineering
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• v.46 no.2
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• pp.68-74
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• 2013

For the coating of diamond films on WC-Co tools, a buffer interlayer is needed because Co catalyzes diamond into graphite. W and Ti were chosen as candidate interlayer materials to prevent the diffusion of Co during diamond deposition. W or Ti interlayer of $1{\mu}m$ thickness was deposited on WC-Co substrate under Ar in a DC magnetron sputter. After seeding treatment of the interlayer-deposited specimens in an ultrasonic bath containing nanometer diamond powders, $2{\mu}m$ thick nanocrystalline diamond (NCD) films were deposited at $600^{\circ}C$ over the metal layers in a 2.45 GHz microwave plasma CVD system. The cross-sectional morphology of films was observed by FESEM. X-ray diffraction and visual Raman spectroscopy were used to confirm the NCD crystal structure. Micro hardness was measured by nano-indenter. The coefficient of friction (COF) was measured by tribology test using ball on disk method. After tribology test, wear tracks were examined by optical microscope and alpha step profiler. Rockwell C indentation test was performed to characterize the adhesion between films and substrate. Ti and W were found good interlayer materials to act as Co diffusion barriers and diamond nucleation layers. The COFs on NCD films with W or Ti interlayer were measured as less than 0.1 whereas that on bare WC-Co was 0.6~1.0. However, W interlayer exhibited better results than Ti in terms of the adhesion to WC-Co substrate and to NCD film. This result is believed to be due to smaller difference in the coefficients of thermal expansion of the related films in the case of W interlayer than Ti one. By varying the thickness of W interlayer as 1, 2, and $4{\mu}m$ with a fixed $2{\mu}m$ thick NCD film, no difference in COF and wear behavior but a significant change in adhesion was observed. It was shown that the thicker the interlayer, the stronger the adhesion. It is suggested that thicker W interlayer is more effective in relieving the residual stress of NCD film during cooling after deposition and results in stronger adhesion.