– Coolant is fed into the insert and through micro-scale ducts
– Primary duct along the edge for even internal cooling
– Smaller secondary ducts exhausting from flank

Currently in the technical feasibility stage, EMI’s Universal Chip Breaking (UCB) technology offers a single cutting insert geometry for all cutting classes (rough, medium, finish). Current chip-control and breaking technologies alter the natural chip flow via obstructions on the rake face of a cutting tool. However, a single vendor may offer as many as twenty different patterns of obstructions to accommodate all cut classes and work materials, leading to poor economies of scale and large vendor/end-user inventories. Furthermore, even the best-chosen tools work well only in certain segments of a profile cut. UCB technology employs special edge geometry to robustly direct the chip toward a more desirable chip breaking event, and does so consistently across all cut classes, work materials and locations within a profile cut.

EMI’s ThikCoat™ technology addresses abrasive wear by creating a significantly thicker hard coating on a substrate than is traditionally possible. Cutting tools are the current area of application, though many other wear-surface applications may benefit from ThikCoat™ technology. ThikCoat™ technology imposes a structured surface micro-geometry in the form of geometrically defined hairs on the substrate to be coated. The coating process then grows the coating on the sides of the hairs, filling in the spaces between them to form a coating with a thickness slightly greater than the hair height and of greater than 85% coating fraction. Thus, ThikCoat™ technology can produce coatings up to 200 μm thick that resist delamination problems that arise when most other coatings are made thicker than about 15-25 μm, especially for delamination-prone diamond coatings, and produces the effectively-thick coating in the same coating time as for a traditional 15-25 μm coating. Thinner applications of PVD coatings, including multi-layering, has potential as well. Cutting-tool applications include tools for drilling and routing highly abrasive fiber-reinforced polymer composites seen in modern aircraft and lightweight vehicles and structures, various processes in metal-matrix composites used in lightweight brakes and in thermal-expansion-matched heat sinks, cutting wood, and even in the machining of difficult-to-machine titanium, heat-resistant super alloys, and high-strength stainless steels that can benefit from a thicker hard coating integrated into a tougher substrate.

Could use more information on this

EMI’s Micro-Jet Array (MJA) precision-cooling technology is derivative of the MQuIC™ concept, except that the coolant is applied at micro-scale via jets originating external to the insert rather than from within the insert. Multiple, adjacent, 50-100 μm nozzles (a one-dimensional nozzle array) produce micro-scale jets that penetrate deeply into the narrowly opening space between the chip and the rake face, and also between the flank face and machined surface. This produces significantly better penetration to the heat sources than does a typical 1 mm diameter jet to the chip’s backside and rake face. The intent is not chip breaking, only cooling. The deep penetration is enabled by the size of the jets, which allows each jet to maintain its integrity much deeper into the narrow spaces noted. Because they are arranged in an array, they evenly apply coolant along the entire cutting edge, and unlike a sheet-like jet alternative, they allow liquid coolant, and any vaporized coolant, to exit the zone via reverse-flow between the jet streams that are entering the zone. There are special features on the insert at the rake face and/or the flank that enable and/or enhance the micro-jet penetration.

Gasses, such as hydrogen, compressed natural gas (CNG), air, and oxygen, are typically stored in pressurized containers for portable applications. Applications include vehicular storage for hydrogen- and CNG-based transportation and oxygen/air storage for home medical oxygen patients, fire/rescue, and SCUBA diving. Relative to traditional cylindrical and spherical storage tanks, CHiPPS™ technology promises arbitrary (conformable) tank shape at traditional pressures.