Periodic Reporting for period 1 - C_CLAW_C_HAWK (C-CLAW - The revolutionary Non-intrusive mechanical Fastener that facilitates life extension of existing infrastructures)
Reporting period: 2022-03-01 to 2023-02-28
Industrial customers have been looking for a long time for non-intrusive mechanical fastening solutions capable of being implemented during regular production. Indeed, conventional assembly methodologies like welding, drilling or riveting are considered as hot works (i.e: risk of explosion) and intrusive (damage of the structure). They may be cheap, but also proved to be sometimes inefficient in terms of environmental & societal impact, safety, associated costs or business interruption. This is where COLD PAD brought a disruptive innovation by introducing reliable and durable structural adhesive bonding techniques for harsh and explosive industrial environments like the Hydrogen industry. Besides the important CO2 reduction potential, our market creating innovation offers a value proposition to lower both capital and operational expenditures linked to structural asset integrity.
COLD PAD’s breakthrough idea to respond to this market need was to bring a new generation of fasteners bonded onto the surface (rather than in the material) with virtually no impact on the support. This was made possible thanks to a set of technologies bringing reliable and repeatable conditions for bonded assemblies and service life even in marine and harsh industrial environments. The disruption is both product-based with the fastener itself and process-based with the installation tooling creating an optimal and humidity-controlled environment. The technology called C-Claw is today protected by a series of 5 patent families.
COLD PAD’s technology is already widely accepted in the Nuclear and Marine&Offshore industry as a reliable solution to make construction and repairs easier and safer. Our challenge is now to scale up our technology.
Hence, the objective of the project is to :
- extend C-Claw fastener range, improve productivity and enhance robustness and reliability of our installation tool
- prepare industrial scale up with volume target of 200 000 fasteners/year and 1000 installation tools
- have an ATEX certified version of the C-Hawk (for safe use in potentially explosive atmosphere)
- prepare our organization for the industrial scale
COLD PAD’s breakthrough idea to respond to this market need was to bring a new generation of fasteners bonded onto the surface (rather than in the material) with virtually no impact on the support. This was made possible thanks to a set of technologies bringing reliable and repeatable conditions for bonded assemblies and service life even in marine and harsh industrial environments. The disruption is both product-based with the fastener itself and process-based with the installation tooling creating an optimal and humidity-controlled environment. The technology called C-Claw is today protected by a series of 5 patent families.
COLD PAD’s technology is already widely accepted in the Nuclear and Marine&Offshore industry as a reliable solution to make construction and repairs easier and safer. Our challenge is now to scale up our technology.
Hence, the objective of the project is to :
- extend C-Claw fastener range, improve productivity and enhance robustness and reliability of our installation tool
- prepare industrial scale up with volume target of 200 000 fasteners/year and 1000 installation tools
- have an ATEX certified version of the C-Hawk (for safe use in potentially explosive atmosphere)
- prepare our organization for the industrial scale
The first period of the C_CLAW-C_HAWK project resulted in several significant findings and improvements.
We started by reselecting the proper adhesive and material for our range of fasteners. We concluded several hundreds of tests to characterize the compatibility of more than 15 types of material with more than 30 adhesive references. We also checked the industrial parameters regarding the adhesive to minimize industrial risk (in particular risk of shortage). This enabled us to select 2 polymers and 1 eco-friendly materials for our new range of fasteners. We satisfactorily checked the behaviour of these materials regarding time and temperature.
We then designed a new version of our current fastener for smaller loads and optimized the design toward less material consumption (-85% stainless steel compared to the current product) and lower cost. We also integrated several innovation bringing new functions such as improved resistance to the environment and faster productivity (expected to be in the range of a few minutes compared to the current 25 minutes of process). We also rationalized the manufacturing process to prepare productivity and scale up.
For the concrete anchor, we started the definition of a technical frame of work towards the definition of EU harmonized rules for surface bonded fasteners and the CE marking of our product.
Regarding the installation tool, we built a new robust concept of tool enabling to achieve our goals with a cost divided by 6. We tested dozens of components and anticipated manufacturing process and achieved a first prototype of this tool. The design choices are compatible with a future ATEX version.
COLD PAD also worked on the Communication and the Preparation for Commercialization of its new range of C-Claw fasteners. We released 18 LinkedIn posts, 4 newsletters and 4 press release regarding bonded fasteners. We also organized several demonstrations and participated to a great number of events, conferences and 1 to 1 client meetings for a large number of applications of bonded fasteners in the Marine, Nuclear and Energy Industry (Wind Energy, O&G Industry) in France and Europe.
We started by reselecting the proper adhesive and material for our range of fasteners. We concluded several hundreds of tests to characterize the compatibility of more than 15 types of material with more than 30 adhesive references. We also checked the industrial parameters regarding the adhesive to minimize industrial risk (in particular risk of shortage). This enabled us to select 2 polymers and 1 eco-friendly materials for our new range of fasteners. We satisfactorily checked the behaviour of these materials regarding time and temperature.
We then designed a new version of our current fastener for smaller loads and optimized the design toward less material consumption (-85% stainless steel compared to the current product) and lower cost. We also integrated several innovation bringing new functions such as improved resistance to the environment and faster productivity (expected to be in the range of a few minutes compared to the current 25 minutes of process). We also rationalized the manufacturing process to prepare productivity and scale up.
For the concrete anchor, we started the definition of a technical frame of work towards the definition of EU harmonized rules for surface bonded fasteners and the CE marking of our product.
Regarding the installation tool, we built a new robust concept of tool enabling to achieve our goals with a cost divided by 6. We tested dozens of components and anticipated manufacturing process and achieved a first prototype of this tool. The design choices are compatible with a future ATEX version.
COLD PAD also worked on the Communication and the Preparation for Commercialization of its new range of C-Claw fasteners. We released 18 LinkedIn posts, 4 newsletters and 4 press release regarding bonded fasteners. We also organized several demonstrations and participated to a great number of events, conferences and 1 to 1 client meetings for a large number of applications of bonded fasteners in the Marine, Nuclear and Energy Industry (Wind Energy, O&G Industry) in France and Europe.
Thanks to the work achieved, we managed to identify an available and viable adhesive reference working on a wide variety of materials and with very good performance even under varying conditions.
We confirmed new technological bricks enabling to extend the life duration of our anchors to 30 years and possibly up to 60 years. We identified backup solution to mitigate risk of dependency toward single reference products.
The new design of fastener produced during the project has shown great performance under various types of loads: tension, shear, creep and short time immersion. The objective of a 300kg capacity is anticipated as easily achievable.
The time for installation of the fastener has been divided by 5 and the process of installation was simplified.
Preliminary concepts of the tools were successfully tested, confirming the potential of the new design both in terms of cost (divided approximately by 6) and performance (compatible with the new product, with a faster installation and a simpler use)
We confirmed new technological bricks enabling to extend the life duration of our anchors to 30 years and possibly up to 60 years. We identified backup solution to mitigate risk of dependency toward single reference products.
The new design of fastener produced during the project has shown great performance under various types of loads: tension, shear, creep and short time immersion. The objective of a 300kg capacity is anticipated as easily achievable.
The time for installation of the fastener has been divided by 5 and the process of installation was simplified.
Preliminary concepts of the tools were successfully tested, confirming the potential of the new design both in terms of cost (divided approximately by 6) and performance (compatible with the new product, with a faster installation and a simpler use)