[3dem] Vacuum (carbon) coating systems
duncan.sousa at rcn.com
duncan.sousa at rcn.com
Tue Oct 7 13:57:52 PDT 2014
Dear Colleagues,
The Biological Science Imaging Resource at FSU is looking to buy a new vacuum coating system. It will primarily be used for making thin carbon for TEM, but we would also like it for rotary shadowing and sputter coating for SEM applications as well. Any advice on current systems would be appreciated. One warning I've had is that switching between SEM sputter coating and carbon evaporation may not be ideal, but I don't know how problematic it may be. I have listed a few systems we are considering below (as well as some comments on coating systems from 2012 at the bottom).
Cressington Systems:
328UHR Ultra High Resolution EM Coating System
208C High Vacuum Turbo Carbon Coater
208HR High Resolution Sputter Coater for FE-SEM
http://www.tedpella.com/cressington_html/Cressington-Introduction.htm
EMS Systems:
EMS150TES
http://www.emsdiasum.com/microscopy/products/equipment/turbo_evaporator.aspx
Edwards System:
HHV Auto306
http://www.hhvltd.com/html/p_auto306.html
Sincerely,
Duncan
__________________________________
Duncan Sousa, Ph. D.
BSIR Coordinator
Department of Biological Science
Florida State University
89 Chieftan Way, Rm 119
Tallahassee, Fl. 32306
Answer 1
We bought the Cresington 208C carbon evaporator about a year ago.
http://www.cressington.com/product_208c.html
We are quite happy with the system. It is reliable and easy to operate.
We also bought the thickness monitor although we do not find it very
useful. We often trust better our traditional method of folding a piece
of filter paper to cash a white shadow that does not get cover by
carbon.
The glow discharge accessory is pretty convenient, fast and easy to
use. If budget allows I would recommend to purchase the system with the
dry vacuum pumping system comprised of the turbo pump and a Dry Scroll
Pump. It will make your system completely oil free and will prevent oil
mist contamination of your grids.
Answer 2
We also bought the Cressington carbon coater 208 recently and I can
fully support Joaquins statement. We have it also with the thickness
monitor but also think that it is not essential to have it. We don't
have the glow discharge from that company so I can not judge on that.
Answer 3
We have many happy customers using the EMS 150 Series of Coaters. It is
a very modern and flexible instrument for a good value. You can buy it
as a rotary- or turbo-pumped system, with carbon-rod and/or carbon-fiber
source. It is possible to upgrade it with Sputter-, Evaporation-,
Aperture-Cleaning- and Glow-Discharge inserts. It always uses the same
base system, vacuum and control unit, therefore it is very flexible and
favorable.
What would you like to coat? - For high-purity carbon, as used for
coating grids, the turbo-pumped, high-vacuum system is a must. We
recommend using a good two to four stage membrane pump as roughing pump.
It is clean, silent, basically maintenance-free, very reliable and cost
efficient. Coating just for conductivity is not a big issue and a rotary
pumped system can be used.
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