Hardide Coatings, England, announces that it will invest $7 million in a new Virginia manufacturing plant to expand its range of specialized nanostructured CVD coatings throughout North America. The company has signed a lease on a 26,000 sq. ft. facility in Martinsville to service customers in the oil and gas, aerospace, flow control, and advanced engineering markets.
The new facility is located within an Enterprise Zone in a state where more than 230 aerospace companies, the Commonwealth Center for Advanced Manufacturing, and two Rolls-Royce facilities are based. It will house CVD coating reactors as well as the latest pre-treatment, inspection, quality assurance, and finishing equipment.
Hardide coatings are a family of nanostructured tungsten- carbide based coatings that that are highly resistant to abrasion, erosion, corrosion, and chemicals, while also being tough, ductile, and impact-resistant. Applied by low temperature chemical vapor deposition, they can coat internal surfaces and complex shapes, and are ideal for parts requiring tight tolerances.
The facility is expected to be operational in the fourth quarter of 2015 and to create up to 29 jobs in the first three years. The investment follows Hardide’s recent increase in capacity at its U.K. facility in Bicester.
