SIMULATION OPTIMIZATION OF THE HEAT TRANSFER CONDITIONS IN HFCVD DIAMOND FILM GROWTH INSIDE HOLES

Abstract

Finite volume method (FVM) is adopted in the present investigation to simulate the temperature and reactant gas velocity distributions in hot filament chemical vapor deposition (HFCVD) diamond film growth inside holes, using a detailed 3D computational model well in accordance with the actual reactor. The influences of the heat transfer characteristic of the substrate and the auxiliary heat transfer conditions are firstly studied by control variable method (CVM), including the thermal conductivity of the substrate k, the size of the red bronze support block V(x × y × z), the cooling water flux Qw, the reactant gas flux Qg, the arrangement of the gas outlets A out and the emissivities of the different solid surfaces ϵ. Thereafter, the substrate temperature data measured in the actual HFCVD reactor with three chosen groups of parameters are compared with those obtained from the simulations, presenting similar trends and small deviations less than 5%. Moreover, the auxiliary heat transfer conditions are optimized for both the WC- Co and SiC substrates based on the simulation and measurement results, and corresponding deposition parameters are also determined. Furthermore, HFCVD diamond films are deposited on the inner surfaces of both the substrates under the optimized conditions. The characterization results show that high-quality diamond films with uniform thickness and fine-faceted crystals are obtained, indicating that this optimization method focusing on the heat transfer conditions is feasible and correct.