During the last years, much interest has been dedicated to the use of P-I-N hydrogenated amorphous silicon-based diodes as radiation detectors, for high energy experiments as well as for medical applications. Although indirect detection is provided with P-I-N diodes several microns thick in conjunction with scintillate layers that transform the radiation into photons, in order to provide a direct detection thicker P-IN diodes (> 50 mu m) are required. These thick layers have been obtained from glow discharge, with parameters and gas mixtures that provide high deposition rates. This work presents results on deposition rates of a-Si:H layers obtained from pure SiH4 in a plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) equipment with parallel plates of equal area, at temperatures between 200 and 350 degrees C, pressure between 2.6 and 60 Pa and a power density of 50 mW/cm(2). Deposition rates of up to 2.5 mu m/h were obtained. P-I-N diodes up to 18 mu m thick, fabricated on these films using photolithographic processes, are characterized.