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Ceramic bore coatings
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Posted by: SFO---------------------
I read today in Performance Racing Industry magazine about a company that produced ceramic bore coatings for automotive racinge engine sleeves.
IRL, Indy, and Nascar, where touted as their users.
Super news to me, they listed email contact names but no web address, repeated attempts at calling and emailing have yielded no response.
Again, any experiences out there?
Seems like new ring coatings or base metals would be in order, as well as respecifying ring groove surface finishes and concentricity.
Looks like hey are putting the coating on Fe sleeves,(no Punny for my bunny).
Still kinda weird, I can see bonding it to aluminum but iron?
An yone?
Posted by: Rich Rohrich---------------------
US Chrome has a process to coat steel sleeves. Eric has worked with them on it. I'll give him a call and get him to give us the lowdown on the process.
Posted by: cujet---------------------
I asked US Chrome about plating my old RZ350 iron cylinders. At the time I called, I was not ready to send them and let them know that. They indicated that they were about ready to start plating the iron bores. They mentioned the nearly unbelievable additional wear resistance as a big selling point, especially on vintage engines where parts are hard to come by.
Chris
Posted by: SFO---------------------
I just talked to this guy finaly.
He said that max power is doing the process on al sleeves.
Isn't max power Erics old plater?
He said to talk to a MR Poeten?
Posted by: MACE---------------------
I'm axiously awaiting this stuff to come to market.
http://www.keronite.com/t_app.html
Perhaps it's already here, but with catchy trade names.
Posted by: DEANSFASTWAY---------------------
Max Power Cyl Apticoat 2000 . Looks really good and have been using them for quite a while now on all cyls . Microsprints on Alxcohol are very hard on cylinders , One of the guys I did a big bore for melted 2 pistons in a cylinder before he found the fuel problem . each time the cylinder required acid etch and mild honing /still running strong . Ive had them plate TRX 250R cylinders (iron sleeve) Yes I think Eric Gorr used to work there or did development with them .
Posted by: EricGorr---------------------
Coatings and other stuff…
Ok guys theres lots of stuff going on here and I’m going to try and cover it without pissing off too many people off in the automotive industry for giving y’all the inside scoop.
Coated Liners – The ad SFO saw in the PRI magazine is for a company named Perfect Bore, located in Andover England. They make liners in a variety of materials and are a preffered F-1 vendor. Materials include aluminum (or as they say in the UK aluminium) steel, and GKN metal matrix composite. Aluminum and MMC liners are used in a wet application for modern F-1 and IRL engines. Steel liners are used in a dry application for cast iron blocks in NASCAR & NHRA applications. They don’t make cast iron liners and coat them, that concept would make their CEO Martin Case cringe! Perfect Bore is owned by Performance Motorsport Inc. which is the group that also owns Wiseco, Vertex, and Carrillo. PMI’s parent company is Dover Diversified. Perfect Bore’s American agent is A.I. LeGrande Wood, known in the racing industry as Woody. He owns DRC (Detroit Racing Components) in Ortonville Michigan. I consider Woody to be one of the most influential innovators in NASCAR racing because he’s responsible for adapting and integrating F-1 racing technology in the form of processes, products, and corporate development to American auto racing. He’s a smart dude and his son Allan races vet motocross and is a DRN member.
Perfect Bore’s coatings are handled by A.T. Poeton & Sons in Gloucester England. That company also owns Max Power Cylinders Inc. in Madison Wisconsin. My connection to these companies started like this; In 1996 Poeton and Perfect Bore started Max Power as a joint venture and contracted me to be the general manager and essentially start the business from scratch, doing site planning, assembling the plant, filing EPA licenses, writing the marketing plan and all the advertisements, hiring and training staff and making the “big machine run”.
Me and Max Power - In 2000 I left my position at MPC because an unqualified individual was hired in a nepotistic fashion by the president of MPC, supposedly to work as my right hand man. He was much younger and was paid much more money than me. This guy hired all of his friends, also unqualified people with no motorcycle industry experience or even basic machining knowledge. The stress of baby-sitting for 75hrs a week was a bit much for me so I re-started my business Forward Motion so I could work one-on-one with my customers involved in motorcycle racing. Contrary to what people on the telephone at Max Power say about me, I gave 6 months notice and fulfilled all the goals outlined by Anthony Poeton including producing a technical manual for performance machining in accordance with a ISO 9001 quality system, a web site, and co-authoring an SAE technical paper that was the basis for marketing efforts to OEMs. All of the negative comments that MPC personel tell customers on the phone about me is untrue, but theres little that I can do about it.
I chose to align myself with US Chrome because Bob Reath, the CEO is an enthusiastic gear-head, with years of experience as a performance innovator and sponsor in IRL and NASCAR racing. USC doesn’t compete against me and our businesses compliment each other. Now that we have that out of the way, lets get back to coatings.
Nickel Composite Coatings – Apticote is a tradename for Poeton and NICOM is a tradename for US Chrome. This is an electrolytic nickel composite coating using nickel as the matrix to dispurse silicon-carbide particles evenly across a bore surface so as to provide a load bearing wear resistant surface. The German Mahle company calls their coating NIKASIL and Kolbenschmit calls theres LOCASIL. They’re all the same thing, no matter what their ads say about ceramic this or composite that, its all essentially a 30 year old technology first pioneered by US Chrome.
Coating Cast iron – Nickel composite coatings can be applied to cast iron but its difficult because cast iron is a dirty material that requires a carefull pretreatment. Companies like RPM and Langcourt offer cast iron plating in their brochures and they do this by coating the entire cylinder in masking material then exposing only the bore. The reason is that the pretreatment acids used for aluminum and ferrous materials like steel and iron are different and will oxidize the other material. The reason why USC doesn’t offer this service for mixed material cylinders like RZ350s is this; if any area of the masking cracks and the acid penetrates it will destroy the aluminum. Most of the people looking to have this work done are doing it for antique parts and USC doesn’t want to take responsibility for a loss like that. Read the other companies brochures, they don’t take responsibility for it either!
Right now US Chrome is the industry leader in plating cast iron blocks in NASCAR racing. The recent 1-engine rule has facilitated the growth of nickel composite coatings in cast iron engines. The reason why Perfect Bore offers steel liners instead is because their coating plant is in England and its too expensive to send blocks back and forth across the pond. Poeton’s also has the ability to coat cast iron blocks and they run a business named APTEC out of their Gloucester works.
Keronite – This is a relatively new coating that’s like a super hard anodizing process that penetrates the surface of aluminum or magnesium. It was developed at the Moscow Aviation Agency during the reign of the old Soviet Union. The two Russian-Jewish scientists that developed it left Russia after the collapse of the Soviet Union. One went to Isreal and started a company called Al-Mag. The other man immigrated to the UK to start Keronite. The main benefits of the coating is that it produces a wear and corrison resistant coating on aluminum and magnesium, without producing any hazardous waste. A tank of electolyte solution contains a high energy anode and parts for coating. The energy required for this process is tremendous and special cooling capabilities must be added to the process. The only Keronite plant in operation in the US is at Max Power in Madison Wisconsin. Anthony Poeton has started a new Poeton group company named Magnesium Coating Inc. to go after the market for corrision resistant magnesium products.
Al-Mag markets the coating in Isreal and the biggest use of the coating is for cylinder bores on 2-cycle drone airplane engines.
Last year USC had some cylinders coated by Keronite UK. The cylinders were honed and tested for wear resistance, thermal transfer, and friction. The results were compared to nickel composite, MMC, and cast iron bores in an SAE paper presented at the 2001 SAE Congress meeting in Detroit. The paper was authored by Dr. John Carpenter and is available from the SAE Bookstore or by request from US Chrome. The results show that Keronite is not a great bore coating because it has thermal barrier characteristics and is relatively soft compared to nickel composite. But it is cheap, disposable, and hazardous waste free. Once a cylinder is coated with Keronite it can’t be repaired like nickel coatings which can be chemically stripped. However there are many great uses for Keronite and if you work at a company that makes aluminum or magnesium parts that require wear or corrosion resistance, contact Anthony Poeton at 1-608-224-2524 to get some tech info on the benefits of the process.
Posted by: SFO---------------------
Woody said nice things about you Eric.
I feel deceived, them calling the same old nicasil coating ceramic... 
Posted by: DEANSFASTWAY---------------------
Hi Eric , I was not trying to push MPC in any real way , just saying that I have had pretty good luck with them . Actually they spoke very highly of you when asked . I would like to confer with you on a late RM 250 motor so maybe Ill send you an E mail . Thanks DEAN
Posted by: EricGorr---------------------
SFO
There is a new type of ceramic composite coating that could be a significant improvement over nickel silicon-carbide. It involves Boron. Perhaps the article or ad you saw reffers to that. I've read some JSAE papers about Suzuki's experiments with Boron coatings, and they even marketed it for a few years on the RMs. USC has a version of the Boron composite coating and they've measured the friction of the cylinder bore and piston assembly on a motored engine. The problem is the cost is very high. Of course those auto racing guys are made of money 
Posted by: BSWIFT---------------------
What timing to read this thread. I recently(July) had a cylinder redone at USC. New piston and bottom end. Three spodely hours later, top end gone, plating coming off in flakes.
No jetting changes were and the rebuild was needed due to (me) improperly mounted air filter. My question, does the "re-retreatment" of plateing degrade the metal and the adhesion or bonding of the plating? Does this sound like a flaw in the cleaning? What type of inspection or testing would be needed to pinpoint the failure. I was running the ceramic coated MaxxPower big bore cylinder, all professionally done.
Posted by: EricGorr---------------------
Brian,
When cylinders are plated they go through a pre-treatment process which includes the use of acids and alkalines (opposites) to etch the cylinder surface. Then a bond coat is used, that contains zinc which acts like a gasket between the aluminum and nickel. Next step is a pure nickel coating which prevents the silicon-carbide particles from imbedding into the cylinder when the piston and rings produce a load on them.
Most aftermarket companies test cylinders for adhesion by putting them in an oven at 250F for 5 hours. If contaminants are trapped under the plating it will produce blisters in the plating.
Theres a lot of reasons why the plating could've come off. The best thing to do is to send me your top end and your invoice and I'll get USC to look into fixing it for you.
Posted by: BSWIFT---------------------
Eric, greatly appreciated. I had the work done thru a local guy and can probably get a copy. I'll give you a call when it is on its way.
BTW, this is a great topic. Very timely(for me anyway). I don't post in here to often but I like what I read.
Posted by: MartinV---------------------
I came across this site by accident. I'm sure Eric needs no-one to defend his honour, but I will anyway. I worked a few years ago at A.T. Poeton, both in Gloucester, England (my home county) and at Madison, Wi. I concur with everything Eric says, Plus I'd like to add that he was one of the best bosses I have ever worked with, and he seems to have limitless stamina. An extremeley creative man, unusually so for an engineer, and disarmingly modest. He was treated badly, but this was because they didn't really understand what he was about. Too many companies these days want the cheap option not the best one. Keep it up Eric!
Posted by: ibmorjamn---------------------
interesting old thread and interesting story about max power. I have viewed Eric's old thread about carb tuning long ago and it was very helpful. I found this thread by doing a search for "Perfect Bore" but not for coating all though this is still a very interesting subject.The MMC replacing the aluminum beryllium piston is my interest.
"Rather than specifically outlawing aluminum-beryllium (as requested by Ferrari) the new ruling for 2001 prohibits the use of any metallic material with a specific modulus of elasticity in excess of 40 Gpa/ (gm/cc). This leaves the door open for a newly introduced Metal Matrix Composite (MMC) material developed for Formula 1 piston manufacture by liner and piston supplier Perfect Bore"
F1 Engine Power Secrets
By Ian Bamsey
appeared in June 2000 RACER magazine
Posted by: cujet---------------------
In the piston engine aircraft industry, all sorts of things have been tried to restore worn cylinders. Many years ago, starting in WWII, chrome plated bores were common on overhauled cylinders. They generally lasted longer than the original cylinder bore (which were steel) but ring seating was problematic, as was oil consumption.
Then a ceramic matrix was tried. This coating process could restore a worn bore to new dimensions, yet it had problems with ring seating, adhesion and wear rates.
Today, a process similar to Nikasil or Nicom (nickel-silicon-carbide) is common on overhauled cylinders. This seems to be working out quite well. Ring seating is considered to be instant. Wear rates are quite low and cylinder bore corrosion is a thing of the past. This coating is good enough that many companies are disassembling new aircraft cylinders, machining the stock nitrided bore slightly oversized and having them plated with Nicom.
Posted by: MXcruiser---------------------
Eric, great article definitely helps me understand these wonderful things more. I have used USC and they are great to work with.
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