RESEARCH IN AND INDUSTRIAL APPLICATION OF METAL SOURCE ION-IMPLANTATION AT BEIJING-NORMAL-UNIVERSITY

High-current metal-ion sources for the surface modification of materia ls have been under development at Beijing Normal University since 1988 . The present paper discusses both a large-scale metal source ion impl anter installed at this Institute at the end of 1995 for research and industrial applications, and a metal plasma deposition/implantation sy stem with three filtered vacuum-are plasma sources. The metal source i mplanter is equipped with three ion sources and hence can provide thre e beams of metal ions into a large target chamber of 80 cm diameter an d 125 cm length. It allows processing of critical components with vari ous shapes and tooling inserts. Cutting tools - such as inserts, drill s, disc cutters and dies - and sophisticated components - such as roto rs and stators of off-gas pumps for returnable artificial satellites - have been implanted with many different metal species to improve prop erties like hardness, wear resistance, coefficient of friction, fatigu e strength, corrosion resistance, adhesion and to prolong lifetimes. S ome good results are presented. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science S.A.