Recycling research
Increasing demand of metal recycling leads to new challenges for industry. New element additions can cause different behaviour during production. At SURF we aim to understand the influence of the effect of recycling on the different moments in the value chain, starting from the purification to casting, processing and finalizing of the product. We use surface sensitive techniques in addition to bulk analysis and perform mechanical and electrochemical experiments to get a better understanding of the different mechanisms of a process. Not exclusively, our current focus lies in chemical etching, anodization, chemical protection by conversion and successive coating with polymers. We then analyse the functional properties like appearance, colour, gloss, adhesion and corrosion susceptibility as well as the mechanical properties changes arising due to the alloy adaptions which recycling can cause.
Check out our research domains in our leaflet:
