Coatings produced using green processes

Edited by the Engineeringtalk editorial team Mar 8, 2005

Poeton Industries has invested considerable resources in a combination of environmentally friendly processing and environmentally friendly coating technology.

To ensure that its Apticote range of coatings meets the most stringent environmental needs of its customers, Poeton Industries has invested considerable resources in a combination of environmentally friendly processing and environmentally friendly coating technology.

Apticote Keronite 3000 for example - described by the company as a quantum leap in coatings for aluminium and magnesium - is ideal for industrial and aerospace applications and, with a hardness in excess of 1500Hv and excellent corrosion resistance, offers significant advantages over chrome plate, electroless nickel, hard anodising and even sprayed ceramic coatings.

An additional benefit for an environmentally conscious industry is that the process uses a completely nontoxic and environmentally friendly wet chemistry, where traditionally the majority of anticorrosion coatings have been based around toxic and or environmentally unfriendly wet chemistry processes.

Besides excellent hardness, the new coating also features very low wear characteristics, excellent corrosion and heat resistance, high dielectric strength and absolute adhesion to a wide range of aluminium alloys.

And, although recent advances in magnesium alloying techniques have improved the corrosion resistance of some cast magnesium grades to a level comparable with aluminium, they still offer little improvement in surface hardness.

So even with these advances there are still restrictions on the use of magnesium.

Again the Apticote Keronite 3000 conversion coating process provides both excellent corrosion resistance and much improved surface hardness, and the potential to enhance corrosion resistance further with the application of specially modified organo-ceramet topcoats.

Its hardness range offers manufacturers significant advantages where reduced weight is crucial and it can be used to increase the wear properties of WE 54 super strong alloys and stiffen ultrathin alloy sections and fabrications.

The environmentally friendly process can handle high volume components manufactured from cast and injection moulded alloys, which broadens the potential applications and in fact, virtually any automotive component that can be made from aluminium can now be made from magnesium.

Apticote Plasmadise 850 is another environmentally friendly coating produced using a dry, nontoxic chemistry.

This new generation high-velocity thermal spray technology creates a range of tough, flexible coatings with excellent wear, nonstick and release properties.

It can solve all the "sticky substance" problems encountered in areas such as adhesive formulation, label printing, tape manufacture or converting.

It is an ideal release system for metal parts that are in contact with adhesives, where it can eliminate downtime and cleaning delays.

Coatings are FDA compliant and USDA approved and typical applications include packaging and printing, food, cosmetics and pharmaceutical production.

In more traditional coating processes such as electroless nickel, recent investment in Poeton's own EDEN (electro dialysis for electroless nickel) project has also produced significant environmental and quality improvements.

Poeton claims it is the first UK surface treatment specialist to install the EDEN environmental system, which has virtually eliminated heavy metal waste produced by the company's two electroless nickel processing lines.

Consistent nickel to phosphorous ratios achieve much more consistent plating rates, which means Poeton is able to coat to much finer tolerances than before.

Tests have confirmed that corrosion and wear resistance levels have also improved and the dialysis guarantees "right first time" high quality consistent nickel phosphorous alloy coatings.

EDEN works by continuously cleaning the process solution in both of Poeton's electroless nickel lines.

It has reduced the monthly volume of spent process solutions by 1500 litres and virtually eliminated the generation of any hazardous heavy metal waste.

Waste from the lines is now less than 25 litres of lower level waste per day and it is clean enough to be disposed of through the company's own plant effluent system.