Characterization of titanium-zirconium-vanadium non evaporable getter coated vacuum chambers

Non evaporable getter (NEG) coating technology development started at UHVTD, Raja Ramanna Centre for Advanced Technology (RRCAT). An UHV compatible, cylindrical magnetron sputtering system for Ti-Zr-V (Titanium-Zirconium-Vanadium) NEG coating was designed, developed and successfully installed at UHVTD, RRCAT. Surface studies play important role in this technology development. Inside surfaces of many vacuum chambers were coated with varying thickness and compositions using this setup. Preliminary studies of adhesion, crystallographic structure & size of crystallites, surface morphology, trapping of argon gas during coating and its release after getter activation were carried out and some results are reported in this paper.