Diamond coating in engines has promise for efficiency improvement

Researchers at Germany’s Fraunhofer Institute have developed a laser arc method for coating engine components they claim could save “billions of litres of fuel worldwide every year”.

Scientists already coat components with diamond-like carbon to minimize friction. But now Fraunhofer researchers have developed a laser arc method that allow layers of carbon almost as hard as diamond to be applied on an industrial scale, at high coating rates and high thicknesses.

By applying coatings to engine components such as piston rings and pins, fuel consumption can be reduced, the engineers said. “Systematic application of our new method could save more than 100 billion litres of fuel each year over the next ten years,” said Professor Andreas Leson of the Fraunhofer Institute for Material and Beam Technology IWS, which is based in Dresden. A study suggesting this was published in the journal Tribology International in 2012.

The scientists said that coating engine components with hard carbon reduces friction to almost zero – a development that could save fuel. Carbon-based coatings are already used in volume production. Now the team of IWS researchers, led by Professor Leson, Dr Hans-Joachim Scheibe and Dr Volker Weihnacht, has succeeded in producing hydrogen-free Ta-C coatings on an industrial scale at a consistent level of quality.