Silicon cladding for mirror substrates

To reduce the finishing costs of silicon carbide mirror substrates, silicon claddings are applied allowing the surfaces to be more easily diamond turned and polished than the bare chemical vapor deposited (CVD) silicon carbide or bimodal reaction bonded SiC (RB-SiC). The benefits of using silicon as the optical face will be reviewed as will the process for applying plasma enhanced chemical vapor (PE-CVD) deposited amorphous silicon cladding on substrates. Using one mirror as an example, the successful finishing results will be shared.