Directed Vapor Deposition

Directed vapor deposition marks a fundamental breakthrough in the way manufacturers apply high-performance coatings. Significantly more efficient than traditional coating technologies, DVD frees manufacturers to coat complex shapes with metals, alloys, and ceramics, with or without a clear line of sight. Coatings can be applied faster than with older methods, with a greater variety of materials, and with a much higher degree of control. DVD cuts the costs of the coating process, ensures high coating performance, and expands coating options.

DVTI is dedicated to meeting your coating needs through the development of advanced coating solutions and the design and manufacture of novel coating deposition systems.

Directed Vapor Deposition: The Next Generation in Coating Technology

Developed by researchers at the University of Virginia in 1994, directed vapor deposition outpaces traditional vapor deposition processes. It allows manufacturers to apply a wide range of high-performance coatings onto various substrates with a higher degree of control and efficiency than has ever before been achieved.

Like physical vapor deposition, DVD uses electron-beam guns to vaporize materials—but with an important difference. These guns have been specially modified to permit their operation in a low vacuum environment, making it possible to envelop the evaporated materials in a jet of carrier gas. By manipulating this gas, operators can control and manipulate these evaporants with unequaled precision, making it possible to develop and apply novel coatings while lowering cost.

Without Gas Jet Unfocused copper vapor (green)	With Gas Jet Focused copper vapor

A Rapidly Maturing Technology

Our latest DVD system takes these innovations a step farther. It permits multisource evaporation and the controlled mixing of these evaporants within the gas jet. Thanks to our multisource technology, manufacturers can mix alloys with distinct properties, change these mixtures on the fly to create alloys with different properties, and form multilayer coatings during a single operation. Industrial researchers can even create combinatorial coating libraries by varying the lateral spread of the deposition flux from each source.

In addition, we have also incorporated plasma to activate and attract the gas and vapor atoms to an electrically biased surface. The combination of multisource e-beam evaporation, carrier gas transport, plasma activation, and biasing opens the possibility for creating ever more complex film structures and compositions.