• Journal of the Korean Society for Heat Treatment
• /
• v.18 no.5
• /
• pp.281-287
• /
• 2005

Titanium aluminium nitride((TiAl)N) film is anticipated as an advanced coating film with wear resistance used for drills, bites etc. and with corrosion resistance at a high temperature. In this study, (TiAl)N thin films were deposited both at room temperature and at elevated substrate temperatures of 573 to 773 K by using a two-facing-targets type DC sputtering system in a mixture Ar and $N_2$ gases. Atomic compositions of the binary Ti-Al alloy target is Al-rich (25Ti-75Al (atm%)). Process parameters such as precursor volume %, substrate temperature and Ar/$N_2$ gas ratio were optimized. The crystallization processes and phase transformations of (TiAl)N thin films were investigated by X-ray diffraction, field-emission scanning electron microscopy. The microhardness of (TiAl)N thin films were measured by a dynamic hardness tester. The films obtained with Ar/$N_2$ gas ratio of 1:3 and at 673 K substrate temperature showed the highest microhardness of $H_v$ 810. The crystallized and phase transformations of (TiAl)N thin films were $Ti_2AlN+AlN{\rightarrow}TiN+AlN$ for Ar/$N_2$ gas ratio of 1:3, $Ti_2AlN+AlN{\rightarrow}TiN+AlN{\rightarrow}Ti_2AlN+TiN+AlN$ for Ar/$N_2$ gas ratio of 1:1 and $TiN+AlN{\rightarrow}Ti_2AlN+TiN+AlN{\rightarrow}Ti_2AlN+AlN{\rightarrow}Ti_2AlN+TiN+AlN$ for Ar/$N_2$ gas ratio of 3:1. The above results are discussed in terms of crystallized phases and microhardness.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Heat Treatment
• /
• v.21 no.1
• /
• pp.3-9
• /
• 2008

Al-Co-N thin films, Al-Co-N/Al-N and Al-Co-N/Al-Co multilayers containing various amounts of Co content were deposited by using a two-facing targets type dc sputtering (TFTS) system. The films were also annealed successively and isothermally at different annealing temperatures. Irrespective of Co content and preparation methods, all the as-deposited films were observed non-magnetized. It was found that annealing conditions can control the magnetic and electrical properties as well as the microstructure of the films.