Using our broad spectrum of competences from chemistry, physics, process technology and modelling, we identify what to test and analyse in order to solve your challenge.

We love complex materials challenges. Whether developing a new process, validating a product or understanding a failure, correct testing one of the essential parts of materials engineering. We often start with a fundamental breakdown of all relevant parameters of influence, typically combined with numerical modelling. Finally, a test design,  sequence and control parameters are setup.

• Corrosion testing
  • Failure analysis, materials selection, validation and process development.
  • We use electrochemical techniques, standard and custom environmental exposures and in-situ monitoring to evaluate and understand the performance of materials and surfaces.
  • We can simulate harsh production environments ex. decontamination by vaporised hydrogen peroxide (VHP) at lab scale.
  • Key industries we service are the pharmaceutical, automotive, food, electronics, surface treatment industries.
• Chemical resistance testing
  • Combined with appropriate characterisation techniques, spillage, immersion and washability testing can be shaped to test and validate a range of exposure scenarios, including heat transfer and sterilisation processes. We have an extensive experience in resistance testing of coatings.
• Hardness testing
  • Nanoindentation, micro and macro hardness measurements, Buchholz, Barcol and Shore hardness and scratch testing are some of the common techniques we use. We often combine these with other testing, such as chemical resistance or washability testing.
• Friction and tribology testing
  • We specialise in friction testing of sheet materials. This includes possibility for testing lubricants under varying surface expansion, pressure, temperature, slide length and with tool surfaces that correspond to industrial conditions.
• Mechanical testing
  • We collaborate with the DTU Center for Advanced Structural and Material Testing (CASMaT) – which enables testing of materials and structures on multiple scales.

Sometimes trivial specifications and parameters have a profound influence on the final outcome/functionality of a component. Knowing how to test and characterise your raw material, part, process or entire product, requires a deep understanding of all parameters, spanning from the raw material production, processing, handling and storage.

Our academic backgrounds provide us  the knowledge and understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of most analysis techniques.

Techniques that we are using on a frequent basis include:

• Optical microscopy
  • A wide range of stereo and metallurgical microscopes are available.
  • The Keyence VHX-6000 offers advanced 2D/3D measurements over large depth of field.
• Scanning electron microscopy (SEM)
  • We are trained on a variety of instruments, from simple table top SEM to advanced field emission gun (FEG-SEM), focused ion beam (FIB SEM) and environmental E-FEG-SEM instruments. Energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS) is possible on most instruments for elemental analysis, and EBSD for grain orientation analysis.
• Transmission electron microscopy (TEM)
  • For even higher resolution of few nanometers, some of the worlds most advanced TEM instruments are available to us, with the possibility of electron diffraction, EDS etc.
• X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS)
  • XPS is a ultra high vacuum technique, that allows for probing of the outer 10 nm of a surface. By angling the incident beam, even higher surface sensitivity can be obtained, and depth profiles can be obtained by sputtering the surface between the scans. By using high resolution spectra, information on chemical bonds can be obtained.
• Computed Tomography X-ray (CT X-ray)
• Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR)
  •  Transmission, ATR and reflectance modes are possible, as well as surface mapping.
• Glow Discharge Optical Emission Spectroscopy (GD-OES)
  • Precise determination of the chemical composition of surface and bulk is possible thorough this technique (destructive).
• Thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and Differential Scanning Calorimetry (DSC)
• Color measurements, gloss and spectrophotometry:
  • The appearance and optical properties of surfaces are measured using both portable handheld devices for color and gloss measurement. In the lab more advanced measurements of surfaces, liquids and gasses are performed using a UV-Vis spectrophotometer
• Metallographic cross sections and analysis
  • We do embedding in cold and hot resins with hardness and grinding properties that are specifically chosen for a given purpose.
  • Polishing is performed on state of the art facilities, in order to produce stress and deformation free cross sections.
  • Etching of material micro structure i done by chemical, electrochemical or sputtering processes.