Food Processing Equipment Coatings

Thermal Spray Technologies offers a variety of coatings for industrial food processing equipment. The coatings are typically used to provide excellent wear and corrosion resistance against the food product being processed. These coatings are also used to provide wear and corrosion resistance on similar equipment used to process pharmaceuticals and personnel hygiene products.

Food processing plungers, seals & shafts ceramic and carbide coated for wear resistance

Food Processing Pump Seals

Food processing mechanical pump seals, made out of stainless steel materials such as 316L SS, are coated with metal oxide ceramics such as chromium oxide and with carbide containing materials for greatly enhanced wear resistance. The coatings are for contact with food. The hardness of the coatings is 1200-1500 Vickers, (70-75 HRC), which is much harder than most food materials that cause the wear. These coatings even hold up to very abrasive products such as toothpaste. Because mechanical face seals have very tight flatness and surface finish requirements the coatings are ground, lapped, and polished to meet flatness tolerances better than 3 helium light bands and smooth finishes less than 4 micro-inch Ra.

Homogenizer Plungers

Homogenizer plungers used to homogenize products such as milk and juices are coated with carbide and oxide ceramic coatings for wear and corrosion protection. These coatings have very high hardnesses 1200-1500 Vickers, (71-76 HRC), are very dense, (less than 1% porosity typical). They can be ground and polished to tight tolerances and surface finishes as smooth as 1 micro-inch Ra. These coatings provide an excellent alternative to hard chromium plating by providing superior wear and corrosion resistance. They also eliminate the environmental concerns associated with hard chromium plating.

Pump Shafts, Sleeves, and Impellers

Food processing pump shafts, sleeves, and impellers can be coated for improved wear resistance. The surfaces typically coated on shafts and sleeves are either seal or bearing surfaces. The coated surfaces can be ground to very smooth finishes, but are typically ground to a finish of 10-16 micro-inch Ra to help in lubricating the seal surfaces. Impellers are typically coated with carbide containing materials for abrasive and erosive wear protection. All of these coatings provide an excellent alternative to hard chrome plating.

Complete Components

Thermal Spray Technologies offers complete pump seals to provide our customers the option of single sourcing for seal components. Our seals are custom machined, coated, lapped, and polished, to meet our customer’s individual designs. With high volume seals we can supply the seals on demand with the use of inventory systems such as Kanban. These systems allow our customers to minimize their inventories, reduce lead times, and maximize their profits.