Synthesis of amorphous carbon nitride using reactive ion beam sputtering deposition with grazing bombardment

Amorphous carbon nitride (a-C:N) thin films were synthesised on steel subst rates using reactive ion beam sputtering deposition (RIBSD). A single ion b eam is arranged to sputter the graphite target at 75 degrees incidence and concurrently bombard the growing film at grazing incidence angles of the io n beam. Nanoindentation, Raman spectroscopy, FTIR, FT-Raman and XPS were em ployed to characterise the mechanical and structural properties of the film s. It was found that grazing incident bombardment has a significant effect on film structure through an increase in nitrogen content and formation of nitrogen doped structure. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserve d.