Longer lifetime ionizer

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Longer lifetime ionizer for the 04-303 and 06-350 ion source.

04-303-ionizer

Longer-lifetime-ionizer

As many of you know, RBD Instruments’ 04-303 and 06-350 ionizer rebuilds last for an average of 1100 hours of run time. Depending on how much sputtering you do, that can translate into anywhere from 2 months to 3 years between ionizer replacements. But wouldn’t it be nice if they could last longer, such as 2000 hours or more?

Introducing the new long life 04-303 and long life 06-350 ionizer! There are two failure mechanisms related to the ionizers that we have addressed with our new and improved rebuild process. First, as part of the normal operation of the filament, tungsten slowly evaporates onto the base of the ionizer. That coating can cause leakage current between the grid and extractor that shows up as pressure on the 11-065 controller even when no gas is being fed into the source. That ghost pressure current typically shows up towards the end of the filament lifetime cycle. We have addressed this problem by cutting a groove into the ceramic base at the location where the tungsten deposit occurs. That groove will prevent the leakage current from happening when the deposition occurs.

The second improvement that we have implemented is a special low temperature filament wire. Besides running much cooler, the wire evaporation rate is greatly reduced so the deposition rate is also reduced proportionally. Just as with our normal ionizer rebuilds, the filament will hold its shape for the entire filament lifetime, resulting in a very stable and repeatable ion current.

Another benefit of our low temperature wire is that it takes much less filament current to get the same emission current as compared to the normal tungsten wire. As a result, the ion gun controller will also run 20% cooler and operate trouble free longer.

So how long with our new ionizer last? We are projecting between 2000 and 2500 hours but need more data to be able to provide an accurate answer. That is where you can help us. We will be offering a few of our new long-life ionizers at a reduced price and in return we ask that you keep a log of how many hours you get before the ionizer burns out. As that data comes in we will be able to provide an accurate average lifetime.

A longer lifetime ionizer pays for itself by reducing how often you need to vent your chamber for maintenance.

For more information or to place an order, please contact us.

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