Materials Assessment

ESR Technology's National Centre of Tribology (NCT) has a multi-disciplinary team of engineers and scientists with vast experience solving materials and tribology based problems. We provide support to owners, suppliers or maintainers, working closely with our clients to understand their problems and prevent reoccurrance.

Our approach involves many disciplines and can include:

• Materials Selection: For new applications this service selects the most appropriate materials and their manufacturing and heat treatment routes. In existing applications experiencing component failure, more appropriate materials can be selected. Our team also has unrivalled expertise in the selection of surface treatments and coatings for wear and corrosion prevention.

• Metallographic Preparation:  Our metallographic facility can handle large components and can prepare metals, polymers, ceramics and cermets. Specialist preparation techniques are available for coated or treated components, powders and geological specimens.

• Non-Destructive Metallographic Replication:  Used to retrieve on-site topographical or microstructural information by polishing and etching metallic surfaces for detailed optical analysis. The results are comparable to laboratory prepared metallographic specimens, without destroying or removing equipment from service. Polymer resins allows features (indents, corrosion pits, cracks, rolling contact fatigue damage) to be assessed using high resolution techniques like WLI profilometery or SEM imaging.

• Optical Microscopy:  We use microscopes fitted with state of the art digital image analysis equipment. In this field, the interpretative skill of the operator is of vital importance.

• Chemical Analysis:  We provide bulk analysis of metals, alloys and non-metals, detailed analysis of local phases, corrosion products, oil debris contamination, etc.

• Mechanical Testing:  Our hardness testing service offers bulk (1-50kg) and rnicro (5g-1kg); we can also undertake impact, tensile and fatigue testing.

• Electron Microscopy:  Our ESEM/EDAX system allows the interpretation of wear or fracture surfaces, surface contaminants, etc. The EDAX is semi-quantitative and allows elemental analysis of bulk materials, particulates and corrosion products.

• Surface Topography:  Contacting and non-contacting White Light Interferometry (WLI) 3D profilometry are used to quantify the factors which govern the successful operation of interacting engineering surfaces.

Contact

Mr Eirwyn Davies

This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

T. +44 (0)1925 843417