Propriedades estruturais e mecânicas do carbeto de vanádio obtido por magnetron sputtering reativo

Abstract

The use of hard coatings has many applications in the metal-mechanic industry due to the improvement of surface properties such as high hardness and wear and corrosion resistance. One of the most important techniques for hard coating deposition is PVD for magnetron sputtering. The present work studies the fabrication and characterization of vanadium carbide (VC) thin films of high hardness for tooling applications. VC thin films were obtained by direct current reactive magnetron sputtering where CH4 was used as C source. The structural behavior of VC thin films were studied by X-ray diffraction (XRD), Rutherford backscattering spectrometry (RBS), Atomic force microscopy (AFM), Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and Raman spectroscopy. The mechanical properties were studied by nanohardness measurements, pin-on-disc tests and profilometry. The CH4 optimum proportion in the gas mixture in order to achieve a VC fcc-crystalline structure is 15 % with a hardness of approximately 25 GPa. The deposition temperature improves the hardness even more where values of 35 GPa can be obtained at 450oC. The film thickness remains constant at variable deposition temperature and the deposition rate is 0.7 µm/h. Two types of fcc-crystalline structures can be deposited. At lower temperatures, carbon atoms occupy tetrahedral interstitial sites and at higher temperatures, carbon atoms occupy octahedral interstitial sites. The topologic study shows that a high roughness diminishes the hardness. In conclusion, the best hardness in VC thin films is achieved when a fcc-crystalline structure is formed with carbon in octahedral sites at high deposition temperature and low roughness. The pin-on-disc tests show that limit thickness in order to avoid this type of wear mechanism at the setting conditions is 2.8 µm (4 hr deposition time). Finally, the oxygen content in the deposition chamber modifies the VC formation mechanism.