A chemical beam epitaxy system comprising low temperature effusion cel
ls and a source of atomic oxygen has been developed for the preparatio
n of cuprate thin films. Superconducting, smooth and single phase c-ax
is Lo(2-x)Ba(x)CuO(4) thin films have been grown using Cu(piv)(2), La(
piv)(3) and Ba(thd)(2) metallorganic precursors, demonstrating the via
bility of this inexpensive technique.