Micromechanical properties of hydrogenated diamond-like carbon multilayers

Hydrogenated diamond-like carbon (H:DLC) coatings including monolayer and multilayers were prepared on single crystal silicon (100) wafers by an RF plasma enhanced chemical vapour deposition (PE-CVD) system. The system has two coating zones A and B where the deposition process and the thickness of each layer can be easily controlled. A nano hardness tester was used to measure hardness and reduced elastic modulus of the coatings, and a nano scratch tester was used to estimate adhesion properties and friction behaviors of the coatings. The result shows that the amorphous carbon multilayers with A(10 إ)/B(4 إ) developed the best micromechanical properties among all the samples.