ADHESION BEHAVIOR OF PVD COATINGS ON ECR PLASMA AND ION-BEAM TREATED POLYMER-FILMS

In a great many cases the well-adhering coating of plastic films requi res a purposive pretreatment. For the in-line treatment prior to physi cal vapor deposition processes, plasma and ion beam techniques will be the method of choice. The success of the pretreatment does not only d epend on the polymer type concerned but, in a highly sensitive manner, also on the intensity and type of processing. Exemplified by polyeste r films, acrylate-coated polyester films and films made of oriented po lypropylene the effects a plasma or ion-beam pretreatment exerts on th e adhesion strength of sputtered and evaporated copper layers are disc ussed. In order to make the results transferable, Langmuir probe and r etarding field analyzer measurements were conducted to assess the ion- current dose of the plasma and the ion-beam treatment, respectively. S ince the layer adhesion often reaches a maximum at extremely low doses of pretreatment, the application of available plasma and ion sources allows one to implement web speeds in a range of some meters per secon d.