CEET partners with Falex Corp.

by Joe King

The Northern Illinois University College of Engineering and Engineering Technology has been invited to participate in the creation of a new research center to test ultra-hard coatings for materials.

The Center for Tribology and Coatings will be operated as a not-for-profit entity by Falex Corp., which has asked CEET to be partner in the project. CTC is in line for a grant from the Department of Defense to create the center, but is awaiting final approval of the appropriation.

“We are very excited at the opportunity to partner with Falex, which has literally set the international standards for test methods and equipment in this important field,” said CEET Dean Promod Vohra, who sits on the board of directors of the center.

“This center will provide research opportunities for our faculty, particularly in mechanical engineering, and it will create research and internship opportunities for students,” Vohra said. “We are always mindful of serving the needs of our region, and coatings are fast becoming of critical importance to manufacturers. Participation in the CTC will help us to become a leader in this field.”

Falex considers NIU an important participant in the CTC, said Andrew Faville, president and CEO of Falex Corp. The university is expected to provide researchers, important facilities and leadership in establishing educational offerings that will play a central role in disseminating the center’s accomplishments.

“We sought out NIU as a partner in this project not only because of its outstanding facilities and faculty, but also because of the attitude that Dean Vohra and the university bring to a project. The college is an ambitious and agile organization that shares our view that when opportunities arise you must seize the day,” Faville said. “We work with universities all over the world. The attitude of NIU’s engineering school when it comes to embracing technology and change creates a wonderful working relationship. We look at NIU as a key long-term partner.”

Tribology is the science of the mechanisms of friction, lubrication and wear of interacting surfaces that are in relative motion.

Sugar Grove, Ill.-based Falex is considered the world’s leading company providing test equipment and research in the field, having created the machinery and tests and developed the standards of measurement most commonly used in this area of study.

The center will focus primarily on creating tests to evaluate new coatings designed to reduce wear and friction of materials. In some cases, such coatings have been found to extend the life of parts by 4 to 10 times.

However, the coatings are often so hard that no fast and economical means of testing them has been devised to evaluate their effectiveness, slowing their acceptance in the broader marketplace. Researchers at the center will work to overcome that barrier by creating new testing protocols and machinery to conduct tests and create standards.

The center also will devise ways to test the behavior of coatings in micro-electromechanical systems and in the nano-scale devices that are coming into use in defense and commercial aerospace, ground warfare vehicles, helicopters, space vehicles, medical devices and many other applications. Coatings are of particular importance in these applications because the machinery is so miniscule that lubricants often lose their lubricating properties at such small scales.

The center will initially be based at Falex headquarters but ultimately will operate at the DuPage Research Park, putting it near coating developers such as Argonne National Laboratory and commercial manufacturing companies that will apply the technology to products rapidly.

11-15-04