Kinetic Metallization TM of High-Valued Military Components

The Navy has a critical need to repair high-value aircraft components damaged by wear, corrosion or mechanical abrasion to reduce maintenance cost and schedules. This need applies to aircraft components on the F/A-18 E/F and EA-18G platforms and to submarine and ship subsystem components. Worn or failed components are scrapped and expensive new parts procured, with excessively long lead times. A cost-effective technology is needed to salvage and restore expensive and hard-to-get consumable military components. Kinetic Metallization ^TM (KM) is a cost-effective, low-pressure, spray deposition process and tool for performing dimensional restoration repairs of aluminum, magnesium, bronze, and high-strength steel alloy components at low temperatures, which does not degrade the material properties of the component. This paper will review military components dimensionally restored with the KM process and present the flight qualification tests performed for these repairs.