Airco, Inc.

E Darrell Erikson

Glen R Scheuermann

Kurt D Kennedy

An improved method is disclosed for coating substrates, such as turbine engine parts, at high rates by a physical vapor deposition process. The substrate to be coated and a vapor source, such as a metal alloy, heated by an electron beam, are placed in a chamber in which a gas pressure of greater than about 5 mT is maintained. When the source material is evaporated at a very high rate, such as greater than about 0.1 g/s or 13 g/s.m.sup. 2, the vapor is collimated and the collimation increases as the gas pressure or the evaporation rate increases. Collimation of the vapor allows a much higher deposition rate for a given evaporation power. Further, a much higher fraction of the evaporated material is deposited on the substrate. Despite the collimation, evaporated material deposits on areas of the substrate which are not in line-of-sight of the vapor source. If desired a substrate bias can be applied to bombard the substrate with ions before and during coating.

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Castro Valley, CA, United States of America

E Darrell Erikson