Aerospace
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The aerospace industry demands high performance from lightweight materials capable of withstanding extreme loads often in an aggressive environment. Surface treatments can extend these performance characteristics by protecting the surface from external damage and extending the cyclic performance.
Controlled Shot Peening
Controlled shot peening is generally a cold working process where the component’s surface is bombarded with small spherical particles to yield the base material, relieving prior manufacturing stresses and inducing residual compressive stresses tailored to suit the base material and application. The applied stress is reduced, enabling better dynamic performance and damage tolerance.
Superfinishing
Superfinishing of components is critical in applications of metal to metal contact such as gears and bearings. Generally applied after the controlled shot peening process to remove surface asperities resulting in reduced wear, macro and/or micro-pitting, noise and operating temperatures.
Shot Peen Forming
Shot peen forming is the preferred method of forming complex aerodynamic contours. This dieless process is ideal for forming wing skins and empennage panels. An extension of this approach will also correct complex parts distorted during machining and/or heat treatment.
Laser Peening
Laser peening can introduce residual compressive stresses in all metallic materials up to 5 to 10 times deeper than other conventional cold working techniques with virtually no surface damage. This clean and extremely controllable process is a production tool of significant benefit where product performance is critical.
Coatings
Selection of the appropriate coating can enable the use of less expensive materials, improve part life and reduce maintenance costs. MIC provides solid film lubricants that protect against adverse operating conditions, impingement coatings for an ultra thin surface, conformal coatings for sealing delicate objects and shielding coatings for electronic devices.
Heat Treatment
MIC specialises in the thermal processing of metallic components to relieve stresses, improve overall strength, ductility and hardness. This includes techniques of vacuum heat treatment, induction hardening, isothermal annealing, atmosphere normalising, carburising, carbonitriding and ferritic nitro carburising.
Applications
Most metallic components used by the aerospace industry, whether for airframe, aero-engine, undercarriage, actuator systems or transmission components (gears for example) use key surface treatments to meet critical material performance targets.
These treatments have undergone laboratory and field testing to ensure reliability in extreme conditions to deal with the following material failure modes:
Fatigue - the initiation and growth of cracks can be controlled by the tailored application of sustainable residual compressive stresses.
Fretting - fretting damage potentially leading to fretting fatigue, can be minimised by the protection of the base materials with appropriate coatings and/or altering mating surface contact points and deep residual compressive stresses.
Galling - the adhesion of opposing surfaces when in contact, can be minimised by a coating protection and/or changes in material properties in the near surface area.
Stress corrosion cracking - the removal of surface tensile stresses or reducing them below threshold levels, can eliminate stress corrosion cracking.
Corrosion - protection of the surface by coating and, where fatigue can result, in combination with deep residual compressive stresses are both essential to minimise this problem.
Wear - wear can be lessened by reducing friction characteristics and/or increasing or altering mating hardness.
