Technique for Polishing Single Crystal Yttrium-Iron-Garnet Spheres (Correspondence)

A simple method of polishing Yttrium-iron-garnet spheres which produces samples of fractional oersted linewidths has been employed at the Air Force Cambridge Research Center. The technique consists of "hand-polishing" the crystal spheres in diamond pastes and aluminum oxide powders of diminishing grit sizes. This method significantly increases, both by greater pres-sure and efficiency of abrasive contact, the rate of removing material from the surface of the sample, which is fundamental in the polishing process.