Tecvac - Hard Coating and Heat Treatment Services

Tecvac offers ultra hard coating, heat treatment and vacuum brazing service from a custom built site near Cambridge.

Tecvac also design, build and service a range of PVD coating, ion implantation and specialist vacuum equipment for customers world-wide, with plants installed in more than 20 countries.

The company runs a large and well equipped R&D Department with strong links to a number of organisations both in the UK (NAMTEC, The Titanium Information Group) and in Europe (Malta University), dedicated to the development of advanced surface engineering processes, novel applications and new process equipment.

Tecvac operates to ISO9000 and BS EN 9100 aerospace quality standards and has Nadcap aerospace approval for coatings. The company employs specialists in both heat treatment and hard PVD coatings to avoid problems that often exist between the processes, while free advice is always available and is best used at the design stage.

The centre, part of The Wallwork Group, is open 24 hours per day and operates a reliable collection and delivery service which, together with other Group sites in Bury and Birmingham, cover most areas of the UK.

Materials and coating technologies

• Plasma treatments
• Thin films
• Ion implantation
• Hard coatings
• Vacuum machine build
• Research and development

Biomedical surfaces:

Making the right choice

Surfaces play a critical part in the performance of all medical devices, whether inside or outside of the body, in a drug delivery systems or at the interface between the body and the implant, the surface properties are crucial to the long term functionality of medical devices.

Tecvac's surface engineering technologies provide bioscientists with the resource to enhance, transform or modify all types of surfaces including:

• Metals
• Ceramics
• Poymers
• Composites

Specialist coatings and surface treatments

• Low temperature plasma treatments to modify the performance of polymers such as PEEK
• Plasma vapour deposition treatments used for containment management or transport of drugs
• Low friction diamond and carbon coatings for instruments, gauges and trials
• Hard biocompatible coatings and treatments for hips, knees and other prosthetic devices
• Tecvac has decades of performance history using the best thin film technology to help medical
designers provide biocompatible surfaces that aid clinical performance at all levels

Definitive solutions

Tecvac's research team includes experienced materials scientists who can advise on process control and technologies including:

• Heat treatments
• Plasma treatments
• Advanced coatings
• Polymer chemistry

To assist biomedical decision-makers make the right choice - advanced processing capability.

Tecvac's coating centre close to Cambridge provides substantial capacity to meet all types of hard coating requirements, often on very short timeframes.

A nationwide transport system serves the needs of critical services and trauma surgery. Clean room facilities and state-of-the-art cleaning plants meet all the needs of engineering, precision assembly and bio-performance standards.

There is only one standard – excellence

Process quality control is the highest priority at Tecvac. Traceable and repeatable processes meet the most stringent standards for processing metals, ceramics and polymers.

Plasma coatings and surface modification

Tecvac's family of low temperature plasma techniques is used to treat polymers and other delicate biocompatible materials. Tecvac's plasma coating application partner -Portal Medical - has developed applications using Tecvac's plasma technology to:

• Clean critical surfaces
• Modify polymer surfaces ready for assembly
• Cross link polymer surfaces to control permeability or other characteristics
• Condition surfaces to promote wetting and adhesion

Portal Medical designs processes and equipment, and provides consultancy, component processing and "on demand" plasma treatment services.

Thin films

Tecvac's PVD and CVD vacuum deposition technologies apply to a wide variety of elements and compounds to metal, ceramic and polymer surfaces. These surfaces are widely used by research teams and volume production clients.

Ion implantation

This low temperature process produces wear-resistant, hardened surfaces for high precision components, such as knee, hip and shoulder prosthesis – where no surface deformation can be tolerated.

Hard coatings

PVD coatings such as Titanium Nitride have been specified by the orthopaedic community for many types of implant and reconstructive surgery. These exceptionally hard coatings provide very low friction, biocompatible surfaces with lifetimes measured in tens of millions of cycles or more. More recently, Tecvac has developed a family of carbon based, lubricious coatings including diamond-like carbon (DLC) and Nitron MC, a WC-C derivative both of which can reduce surface friction to negligible levels. Biotechnologists can specify a wide range of properties, varying from hardness comparable with diamond to the lubricity of graphite.

Collaborative ventures and research projects

Tecvac's team operates within a number of Pan-European research and development projects. It has close links with research teams at the University of Sheffield, University of Northumbria and many other institutions throughout the world.

Research machine building

Tecvac have the capabilities to design, manufacture and test vacuum processing systems. To date, we have built over 40 machines for research, academic and industrial institutions in 15 counties.

Tecvac Ltd.
Buckingway Business Park
Swavesey
Cambridge
CB24 4UG
Tel: 01954 233 700
Fax: 01954 233 733
enquiries@tecvac.com

Wallwork Heat Treatment Ltd.
Lord Street
Bury
BL9 0RE
Tel: 0161 797 9111
Fax: 0161 763 1861
sales@wallworkht.com

Wallwork Heat Treatment
(Birmingham) Ltd
Sydenham Road
Smallheath
Birmingham
B11 1DQ
Tel: 0121 628 2552
Fax: 0121 628 1555
enquiries.birmingham@wallworkht.com
info@tecvac.com
www.tecvac.co.uk