Severe service applications like mining and power generation can create a lot of wear on valves. However, carbide coating in Houston for valve components can help improve the service life of isolation valves. For example, tungsten carbide and chromium carbide can help improve wear resistance for a wide range of industries to help reduce downtime, repair, and replacement costs for your applications.
How Does Carbide Coating in Houston Work?
How exactly do we coat valve components with carbide materials? Generally, we apply carbide coating in Houston with thermal spray technology, like high velocity oxygen fuel (HVOF) or plasma spray.
The process starts with the coating powder. Typically, the powder will consist of the carbide best for your severe service application and a binder, such as cobalt or nickel chrome. Then, we heat this powder until it’s molten and spray it directly at the coating surface. The high heat and pressure creates high amounts of kinetic energy in the particles. So, once the particles hit the coating surface, this energy comes to a rapid stop, which forms a high strength bond between the surface and the coating.
Typically, this process only takes an hour or so to provide a high quality coating that helps reduce wear on valve components for severe service applications.
Benefits of Tungsten Carbide Valve Coatings
Carbide coating in Houston can be customized based on your specific application needs. Generally, this involves changing the carbide particle size and also the ratio of tungsten carbide to the binder (such as cobalt). Therefore, our experts work with you to determine the coating characteristics you need for your valve applications.
One of the main benefits of tungsten carbide is that it is about twice as strong as steel. Therefore, it a great coating option for a metal seated ball valve or other severe service valve.
Here are the Rockwell scale ratings for a few different carbide coatings:
| Coating | RC Hardness |
| Tungsten carbide and cobalt | 60-65 |
| Tungsten carbide and nickel-chrome | 53-58 |
| Tungsten carbide, cobalt, and chromium | 60-70 |
| Chrome carbide and nickel chrome | 60-67 |
Also, tungsten carbide offers about two times the density of steel. When applied with thermal spray, it offers superior bonding to valve surfaces. It also helps with wear resistance for abrasion, erosion, galling, and fretting.
Therefore, with tungsten carbide coating in Houston, you get valve components with high hardness ratings, low porosity, abrasion resistance, high temperature ratings, and some corrosion resistance. However, if your application is high in abrasives and corrosives, then you may want to opt for chromium carbide over tungsten carbide, as it provides good abrasion and corrosion resistance.
For superior valves and valve coatings, our specialists at Copeland Valve & Coating Technologies offer cutting-edge technologies for your needs. We design and manufacture a wide range of valve and coating solutions for heavy-duty industries. We proudly create all our custom valves and coatings right here in Texas for excellent quality control so you can trust that your valves are safe, reliable, and long-lasting. Call us today at (713) 926-7481 to request a quote!