How Selecting Adhesives with The Right Specs Combats Wear

It’s no surprise that when one material moves over the surface of another, the softer of the two materials wears out at some point. We’ve all seen the impact abrasion wear has on the reliability and longevity of fixed plant and equipment – from equipment failure and costly part replacements to unplanned shutdowns.

With many factors including aggregate hardness, shape, mass, and velocity influencing abrasion wear, it’s critical you choose the right adhesives for the right application. That’s where epoxy protection systems like Devcon® Megawear can be used as a line of defence against abrasion. Devcon® Megawear is a high density, alumina ceramic bead-filled, toughened epoxy system with improved flexibility modifiers that enhances impact resistance. It’s non-sag formulation makes shaping and mixing the epoxy easy with excellent hang-up on vertical and overhead surfaces.

For particle sizes less than 3mm, Devcon® Wear Guard Fine Load is ideal for dust particulate applications, slurry pumps, scrubbers, screens, and screw conveyors. The product is a wear-resistant, non-sag, epoxy putty containing highalumina ceramic beads. These beaded compounds incorporate ceramic fillers that are extremely hard and encapsulated in a strong epoxy system, which offer prolonged protection and optimised wear life.

There’s also additives such as coupling agents and crosslinkers, that are incorporated into the epoxy chemistry to provide toughness, and a bond between the epoxy and the ceramic fillers. The better the epoxy system and coupling agent combination, the longer the ceramic beads remain in place, meaning a long protective period between coating maintenance.

Typically, four abrasive wear machanisms exist, at a microscopic level they present and result as:

1. Cutting – hard and/or sharp structures cut into the softer materials
2. Fracture – brittle (micro) fracture, which occurs in most ceramics
3. Fatigue – repeated (plastic) deformation of the material, like with ductile materials
4. Grain pull-out – detachment of material grain at the weaker boundaries, as is the case with ceramics

If you’re in the market for adhesives to combat wear and abrasion, then it’s time to explore the Devcon® range. Check out the Devcon® range here. 

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