Design and construction of a high-vacuum coating system

Abstract

Since the sixteen hundreds, during which time the creation of vacuum has born, the field of vacuum science and technology has penetrated through a wide variety of disciplines. Nowadays, vacuum technology is applied in Engineering, Physics, Chemistry, and even the Medicine field just to mention a few. The field of vacuum science and technology is still being developed according to new challenges and demands in electrical engineering, electronics, medical studies, and others. Space technology, the food industry and evaporation processes just to mention a few applications would be hardly imaginable without the benefits of vacuum technology. Indeed, it was the aim of this project to design and construct all necessary subsystems that constitute a high-vacuum system when combined. The high-vacuum environment created here will serve for vacuum metallizing processes in future times. The work involved all designs of each sub-system including the design of an aluminium base plate worked exclusively for this project. The project evolved through construction with a continuous follow up of previous designs. In parallel with pumping towards high-vacuum pressure, a data logging system acquires and records the necessary information such as time and voltage, through a PC. Eventually, the system was operated and tested for any malfunction, which could result due to imperfect designs or wrong constructional procedures. Meanwhile, the system characteristics including the behaviour of pressure fluctuations were established and it was affirmed that the system fully operates correctly and reaches a high-vacuum pressure within minutes, as expected.