Ceramic based coatings as solution for several surface unsolved problems on mould industry

Objective

There is a great potential interest in the molding industry regarding production of moulds for low and mid series of plastic products. Actually, alloy steel moulds are used for the fabrication of low, mid and high series products. For mid and low series steel moulds are very expensive and they have excessive mechanical strength. Light alloys are now used with success in the production of prototypes for mould design optimization, that are adequate only for very short series, but they can be an interesting solution for low and mid series, if the surface resistance is improved. Ceramic hard coatings can be a solution for this problem. However, great difficulties related to the important mismatches between the mechanical and thermal properties of the Al alloys and the hard ceramic coatings lead to in service failure. In this project, this problem can be overcome by optimizing the system based in Ti-Al, with variable nitrogen contents, owing to the fact that Ti-Al (N) has high hardness and a much higher thermal expansion coefficient that traditional hard coatings which can significantly decrease the thermal stresses during the deposition. New opportunities will be created for all

Programme(s)

• FP5-GROWTH - Programme for research technological development and demonstration on "Competitive and sustainable growth 1998-2002"

Topic(s)

• 1.1.3.-5. - RTD Activities of a Generic Nature : materials and their technologies for production and transformation and new and improved materials and production technologies in the steel field

Funding Scheme

EAW - Exploratory awards

Coordinator

3DTECH-PRODUCAO, OPTIMIZACAO E REENGENHARIA

Address

Estrada De Leiria 210 -Embra
2431-967 Marinha Grande
Portugal

Participants (1)

DURIT HARTMETALL GMBH

Germany

Address

Saarbrucker Strasse 14-16
42289 Wuppertal