Studies on the residual stress of fluorine-doped SnO2 film deposited by chemical vapor deposition

Abstract Fluorine-doped tin oxide films were deposited on Na-Ca-Si glass substrate at 650 °C by chemical vapor deposition, and then heat treatment was carried out at 200 °C, 400 °C and 600 °C for 4 min in a resistance furnace. The residual stress in SnO 2 :F films was systematically measured using the sin 2 Ψ method based on X-ray diffraction. The incidence angle was adopted as Ψ  = 0°, 15°, 20°, 25° and 30°. The results showed that the films were polycrystalline with tetragonal SnO 2 structure, together with a weak peak of SnO phase. All the films exhibited a preferred orientation with the (200) plane. The minimum value of residual stress (− 0.24 ± 0.01 GPa) was obtained when the films were heat-treated at 200 °C.