Soleras Ltd.

Soleras Ltd., located in Biddeford, Maine, has supplied the vacuum coating industry for over 25 years. Soleras is a supplier of sputter targets, metallic bonding, original and enhanced Backing Plates and vacuum metalization related spare parts. Soleras has evolved into a multi-disciplined manufacturer of materials, vacuum components and consumables.

The company has capabilities in product design, reverse engineering, and failure analysis. Our engineering department utilizes five computer aided design Pro Engineer work stations. Our quality department has full traceability / analysis of materials. Our documentation department maintains archival data on products, designs and materials.

A valuable capability is the reverse engineering and enhancement of masking, shielding, cooling, copper / stainless parts. Original parts are normally not complicated, but problems often come later from the system application.

Soleras can help design parts to have superior performance under conditions of increased power, limited cooling, adverse process performance from non-uniform target temperatures and/or the uniformity needed for ceramic and oxide targets.

Soleras’ ability to fabricate components via CNC machining, high temperature vacuum brazing, hot isostatic pressing, vacuum melting, Electron Beam welding and helium leak testing, allows a design freedom not available from most vendors. Soleras has solutions for problems caused by copper’s softness on critical diameters, stability, strength, seal surfaces, threads, or o-ring grooves.

This is achieved by brazing stainless steel into the copper body. The technique is also used to improve the rigidity, while maintaining the cooling function. Improved heat transfer characteristics for copper parts are not limited to Backing Plates. Chill and Hot plates, and non-vacuum assemblies often benefit from a design enhancement.