Understanding Directed Vapor Deposition

Much of the initial experimental PCD research at IPML has been devoted to understanding the behavior of the University of Virginia's Directed Vapor Deposition (DVD) technology. This system was originally conceived of as a method for rapidly and efficiently coating continuous fiber reinforcment for metal matrix composites with refractory alloy matrices. The technology proposed to achieve this goal by using a gas jet in combination with an electron-beam gun for focussed vapor deposition.

Significant effort has been invested to understand the features of the gas jet and how those features affect vapor deposition in a DVD system.

Once the basic structure of the gas jet was identified and understood, efforts were made to uncover how these structures and the underlying process variables generating these structures influenced material deposition characteristics. This research emphasized understanding the relationship between deposition efficiency and process parameter variation.

Other research has briefly explored the ability of DVD to deposit pure materials with low contamination levels from the gas jet, compounds using reactive elements in the gas jet, and other materials for specific applications. To gain a more complete understanding of DVD please see the literature, the dissertation of James Groves, or send e-mail to James Groves with questions.