A new manufacturing process coats plough blades and cultivator tines with a hard, protective layer using automated powder metallurgy, replacing the manual brazing of tungsten carbide tiles. Current soil-working tools fail prematurely because their protective coatings are applied by hand, leaving large areas of the tool surface exposed to abrasive soil, rocks, and corrosive fertilisers. This manual process is slow, expensive, and limited in coverage. PRO-POINT automates the coating application using computer-controlled robotic arms, applying a cheaper, abundant material in place of tungsten. The process is designed to protect the entire tool surface, not just the high-wear zones. If successful, the project expects to cut manufacturing costs by roughly 30% while extending tool life. Farmers would replace broken cultivator points and ploughshares less often, reducing downtime and equipment costs. The same coating technology could later be adapted for components in energy, transportation, and oil and gas industries—anywhere metal parts suffer from wear, impact, or corrosion.
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PRO-POINT uses an advanced powder metallurgy process to create wear, impact, and corrosion resistant coatings on agricultural soil working tools. These coatings extend tools' service life when compared to current state-of-the-art alternatives available on the market. The innovative manufacturing process used in PRO-POINT is flexible, fast, and low-cost compared to current technologies. Current state-of-the-art soil working tools are made by manual brazing of tungsten carbide tiles or manual hard-facings on conventional steel tools in areas of highest wear. The manual and sequential nature of these processes restricts the ability to protect entire abradable surfaces of the tool. This often results in premature tools\` failure due to damages to tool surfaces that are not protected. Through automation, efficient materials and energy utilisation, and use of less expensive coating materials, the new coating to be developed in PRO-POINT is expected to cut the manufacturing costs by ~30%. Tungsten will be replaced with cheaper and abundant materials. Full automation and computer numerical control (CNC) driven gantry or robotic arms will be used to create optimised coating patterns designed using simulation and field testing, protecting the entire surface of the soil working tool. The main project challenges are in (1) identifying the correct chemical composition to provide necessary wear and corrosion resistant properties and (2) matching them with the correct processing parameters and conditions for sufficient bonding of the coatings with the tools\` substrate. Once the coating process has been established, the project team will aim to exploit the technology to a wider range of agricultural tools and applications outside of the agricultural sector, such as energy, transportation, and oil & gas.
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