A Cr Anti-Sticking Layer for Improving Mold Release Quality in Electrochemical Replication of PVC Optical Molds

This paper addresses the issue of mold release quality in an electrochemical replication of an optical polyvinyl chloride (PVC) mold, which has microlens array or microprisms array on its surface. The main idea is to deposit a nanoscale Cr thin layer as an antisticking layer on the PVC mold surface, followed by Ag film deposition as the conductive layer using magnetron sputtering, and finally, a nickel layer is electrochemically deposited on the Ag surface. By doing so, the upripping of the nickel mold from the PVC mold becomes easier, resulting in better mold release quality. The experiment results showed that when the Cr antisticking layer was used, the release strength between the nickel mold and the PVC substrate reduced from 1.94 N/cm to 1.43 N/cm, the surface roughness of the PVC substrate after mold release reduced from 0.60 μm to 0.55 μm, the surface roughness of the nickel mold reduced from 0.63 μm to 0.49 μm, the retroreflection coefficient of the nickel mold increased from 1600 cd·lx(−1)·m(−2) to 2100 cd·lx(−1)·m(−2), and the surface energy of the PVC substrate reduced from 31.47 mN/m to 15.53 mN/m.