AVS 46th International Symposium
    Magnetic Interfaces and Nanostructures Technical Group Tuesday Sessions
       Session MI+VM+AS-TuM

Paper MI+VM+AS-TuM10
Characterization of Hard Disk Drives by Time-of-Flight Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry (TOF-SIMS)

Tuesday, October 26, 1999, 11:20 am, Room 618/619

Session: Magnetic Recording: Media
Presenter: B. Hagenhoff, TASCON GmbH, Germany
Authors: B. Hagenhoff, TASCON GmbH, Germany
R. Kersting, TASCON GmbH, Germany
D. Rading, ION-TOF GmbH, Germany
S. Kayser, ION-TOF GmbH, Germany
E. Niehuis, ION-TOF GmbH, Germany
Correspondent: Click to Email
Hard disks used in hard disk drives consist of a complex inorganic and organic layer structure. Whereas substrate near layers are inorganic of origin and can be comparatively thick, layers closer to the surface become very thin and are finally covered by an organic F containing lubricant. Defective production processes as well as normal use can change the original layer structure and composition. For an analytical characterization of these changes a technique is required which gives detailed information on the chemical composition in lateral as well in depth directions. Time-of-flight secondary ion mass spectrometry (TOF-SIMS) is ideally suited to perform this task because it offers elemental as well as molecular information with high sensitivity. A 3-D representation of the sample can be obtained by combining sputter depth profiling and imaging. With modern TOF-SIMS instruments meanwhile a lateral resolution of less than 200 nm and a depth resolution of only a few nm can be obtained. We therefore applied TOF-SIMS to the characterization of commercially available hard disks. We concentrated on the identification of the lubricant present in the uppermost monolayer, screening for corrosion spots and layer structure elucidation. Special emphasis was laid on the automation of measurement and data evaluation routines in order to enhance sample throughput for industrial applications. Examples for spectroscopy, imaging and depth profiling will be presented.