The use of top surface imaging processes pushes the limits of both deep ultraviolet lithography and e-beam direct writing. However, the flow effect due to silylation with monofunctional aminosilanes prevents the creation of a faithful resist mask of a high resolution. The application of mixed mono- and bifunctional agents causes crosslinking of the silylated resist and eliminates the flow. We investigated details of the silylation of novolak-based chemically amplified resists with a mixture of bis(dimethylamino)methylsilane and dimethylsilydiethylamine. After mixing, new materials evolved until a stable ratio of all components was reached. During silylation the ratio changes again and requires a continuous adaptation of the silylation parameters. The optimized process enables the realization of a 0.15 μm pattern in 0.7 μm thick resist. An inductively coupled plasma etcher was evaluated for transferring of the resulting resist structures into typical aluminium alloys. The developed process enables the etch...