Every month we are finding new areas of application, often while working with the companies or universities who have presented us with their challenge. We look into the possibilities and regularly come up with surprising results.
Cold Spray is a technology that now allows us to apply a new metallic layer to workpieces without heating them. This makes Cold Spray suitable for carrying out temporary or permanent repairs as well as having applications in serial manufacturing processes.
The latest advancements have shown that Cold Spray is also highly suited to additive manufacturing (3D printing). Adverse effects of heat, such as stresses and distortions are no longer an issue. After all, the technique is not based on the tried and tested ‘melt-solidify principle’, but on supersonic speeds without a melting process. Cold Spray can be applied on metal, glass, ceramics and many plastics.
There are two variants of this unique, innovative and widely applicable technique:
Dycomet has been a supplier of Cold Spray equipment since 2006. Each Cold Spray variant has its own areas of application. In our Open Laboratory we can demonstrate the various techniques. Dycomet Europe BV can offer everything that is currently possible using the different Cold Spray variants.
Cold Spray and the Environment. Cold Spray helps create a more sustainable world because:
⦁ No harmful gases are emitted (no combustion process)
⦁ Machinery and parts have a longer service life
⦁ Raw materials are used efficiently (local application of functional layers)
In the mid-1980s scientists in Russia discovered that when small metal particles are sprayed onto a substrate at supersonic speeds, they bond with it. Over the years, research continued into the phenomenon that metal particles bond solely due to kinetic energy, and the technology was developed under the name of ‘Cold Spray’ or Gas Dynamic Spray (GDS).
As the process involves metal bonding using supersonic speeds (i.e. without a melting process) rather that the tried and tested ‘melt-solidify principle’, negative effects of high temperatures, such as stresses and distortion, are no longer an issue. Cold Spray technology is considered to be the newest member of the ‘thermal spraying family’; however this unique feature places ‘Cold Spray’ in a league of its own.
