Equipments

Tribology Group

Tribometers

Tribometers chracterize friction and wear.
Tribometers have several methods. It is necessary to select the most suitable method depending on the object to be examined.

  • Thrust Cylinder Type
    Tribometer　EFM-3
    • With one-way rotation, face-to-face contact test and point contact test can be performed by thrust cylinder type and pin-on-disk type, respectively.
    • Dry conditions and lubrication conditions by oil bath can be tested.
    • It is suitable for the evaluation of plain bearing materials.
  • Bloch-on-Ring
    Tribometer LFW-I
    • Line contact test and face-to-face contact test can be perfomed under dry conditions and lubrication conditions with oil bath by block-on-ring type and with one-way rotation.
    • It is suitable for the evaluation of engine oil, transmission oil, etc..
  • Fretting
    Tribometer SRV 3
    • With reciprocating motion, point contact test and line contact test can be performed by ball-on-plate type and cylinder-on-plate type, repectively.
    • Dry conditions and lubrication conditions by minimal amout and with oil bath can be tested.
    • Coefficient of friction can be measured while changing load and oscillation speed under computer control.
    • It is suitable for the evaluation of lubrication characteristics and seizure resistance of oil and grease.
  • High-Speed Reciprocating Friction Tester
    • This tester is used to evaluate piston rings and cylinder liners, and is possible to experiment with dry conditions, minimal quantity lubricationa (application), and lubrication conditions by continuous dripping using a pump.
  • High-Temperature Friction Tester
    • You can perform reciprocating pin-on-plate friction tests of metal, ceramic and resin specimens at high temperatures because metal-based specimen holder can be heated by high frequency induction heating.
  • Light Load Friction Force Distribution Measuring Device
    • Reciprocating friction measurement and friction distribution measurement can be performed using the pin-on-plate method with a light load (up to 98 mN).
  • Friction Player
    (Pin-on-Disk Tribometer)
    • Tribometer can be performed for same-circle rotation, circular reciprocating sliding, and linear reciprocating sliding.
    • It is capable of measuring in liquid and heating.

Bearing Tester

Equipment for fatigue testing and life testing for rolling bearings.

  • JSPS Type Ball Bearing Life Tester It is one of the standard bearing tester in Japan developed by the 126th Committee on Rolling Bearing Life in the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (currently active as Technical Committee on Life of Rolling Bearings in the Japanese Society of Tribologists). A life test (fatigue test) is performed by applying a constant load to the test radial bearing and rotating it at a constant speed. The life distribution data and other research results obtained by this bearing tester are widely disclosed to the general public through reports, papers, and explanatory articles.
  • Multiple Radial
    Rolling Bearing Life Tester     A life test (fatigue test) is performed by applying a constant load to multiple test radial bearings and rotating them at a constant speed. It is suitable as a platform for research for diagnosis because it targets versatile radial bearings.
  • Thrust Ball Bearing Life Tester A life test (fatigue test) is performed by applying a load to the test bearing (thrust bearing) and rotating it at a constant speed. Due to the structure of thrust bearings, all rolling elements are operated under a constant load. Therefore, It is suited to reliability assessment for bearing washer materials and rolling element materials because it is sensitive to the number of stress repetitions.

Evaluation/Sample Preparation Equipment

Equipments for measuring and evaluating characteristics of the surfaces before/after friction and wear, and surface conditions/Sample preparation equipment.

  • Non-Contact Profilometer
    （Zygo NewView 5000）
    • This is a non-contact surface profilometer using scanning white light interferometry.
    • Wear scar, surface roughness and cross-sectional profiles can be easily observed and measured.
  • Scanning Electron Microscope
    （JSM-7400F）
    • You can take secondary electron and compositional images. Also you can perform surface, point and line elemental analysis including light elements.
    • You can observe 25 to 650,000 times at the accelerating voltage of 0.1 kV to 30 kV using this microscope.
  • Scanning Electron Microscope
    （JSM-6060）
    • It is equipped with a large chamber for observing large samples.
    • An EDS is also available for qualitative and quantitative analysis of various elements.
  • X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy
    （ThetaProbe）
    • The constituent elements of the sample surface and their chemical states can be analyzed.
    • Simultaneous angle-resolved XPS spectra can be acquired.
    • A chamber with an atmosphere-controlled friction units allows surface analysis before and after friction testing without the effects of air pollution.
  • Spark Plasma Sintering Machine
    • Its maximum sintering temperature is 2400 degree C. You can obtain dense and porous resin, metal, ceramic and composite samples using this machine.

Advanced Functional Surface Group

Microstructure Processing Equipment

  • 3-way RF magnetron sputtering system (No.1)
  • 3-way RF magnetron sputtering system (No. 2)
  • EB evaporation system
  • Parallel plate reactive etching system
  • Magnetic induction reactive etching system
  • UV nanoimprint lithography system
  • Projection aligner
  • Double-sided aligner
  • Spin coater
  • Screen printer
  • Magnetizers
  • Vacuum rotary/rotary mixer
  • Non-electric field plating machine
  • Electric field plating machine
  • multi-layer dip coating equipment
  • Vacuum heating furnace
  • Vacuum drying furnace (No. 1)
  • Vacuum drying furnace (No. 2)
  • Vacuum drying furnace (No. 3)
  • Cooling furnace

Metal and resin processing equipment

  • Injection molding machine
  • Large-area nanoimprinting equipment
  • Cutting machine
  • Tool scraping equipment
  • Biaxial mixing machine
  • Film extrusion machine
  • Pelletizer
  • Mixer
  • Resin dryer
  • Pulverizer
  • Weighing and mixing machine
  • CO2 laser cutting machine
  • Thermo-compression bonding equipment
  • Corona treatment machine
  • 3D printer (No. 1)
  • Large-scale 3D printer (No. 2)
  • 3D printer (No. 3)

Evaluation equipment

  • Energy dispersive X-ray analyzer (EDX)
  • Large UV/Visible spectrophotometer
  • Scanning probe microscope (AFM)
  • Tentacle surface profiler (DEKTAK)
  • Fourier transform infrared spectrophotometer (FTIR)
  • Differential scanning calorimeter (DSC)
  • Thermogravimetry (TGA)
  • Laser microscope
  • Microtome
  • Cross-section polisher
  • Contact angle measuring device
  • Friction Force Measuring Equipment
  • High-temperature humidification tester
  • Microscopic and visible spectrometer for lenses
  • Microscopic Spectrometer
  • Vacuum Electron Dyeing Equipment
  • Osmium coater
  • Polishing machine
  • Magnetizers
  • Shaker
  • Optical microscopes
  • Stereo microscope
  • 3D Imaging Type Stereo Microscope
  • Microscopes
  • Optical evaluation equipment (surface plate, etc.)

Original equipment designed and manufactured by AIST

  • UV nanoimprint lithography equipment UV nanoimprint lithography equipment is used to perform nano-lithography using UV nanoimprint. We perform nanometer-order lithography on the surface of 8-inch wafers to fabricate molds.
  • Electroless plating system This is an automatic electroless plating system that performs thick nickel plating for optical lens molds on the surface of heat insulating materials and metal molds. We have performed electroless nickel plating of 200-300μm thickness on the surface of mainly heat insulating materials and standard metal molds to produce optical lens pieces.
  • Film Extrusion Molding Machine This machine forms 350mm wide continuous films. We have been engaged in the research and development of high-functional surface components combining materials and structures by integrating biaxial blending machines and fine nano-transcription technology.
  • Thermal welding machine This machine forms 350mm wide continuous film. We have been engaged in the research and development of high-functional surface components combining materials and structures by integrating our biaxial mixing machine and fine nano-transcription technology.
  • Multi-layer Dip Coating System This system automatically processes multiple solutions according to a pre-programmed schedule. We use this equipment for the development of coating technology using multiple solutions.

Hybrid Coating

  • Multi-purpose Large-scale Coating System This is a multi-purpose coating system equipped with an industrial robot in a large chamber of 2 m class. We can handle everything from 3D-driven hybrid AD systems to cold spraying.
  • Decompression plasma spraying system 40 kW class DC plasma spraying system that can be applied under reduced pressure.
  • Hybrid AD system (general-purpose) Hybrid coating system for prototyping ceramic coatings, equipped with a 5-axis stage and capable of applying coatings to three-dimensional objects.
  • Hybrid AD equipment Hybrid coating equipment for prototyping of ceramic coatings.
  • Nanoindenter equipment in SEM This is a nano-indenter that enables evaluation of micromechanical properties in scanning electron microscope.

Structural and Processing Reliability Group

Materials testing and materials evaluation testing machines

These are devices that evaluate the mechanical properties, the processing and the characteristic of the materials.

  • Macro-materials testing machine This device performs the macro-material mechanical test under the high-temperature and moist environments.
  • Micro-materials testing machine This device performs the micro-material mechanical test.。
  • Focused ion beam (FIB) machining system This device processes the micron-size test piece.
  • Nano indentor
    Nano indentor This device performs the nano-hardness measurement.
  • Thermoelastic stress analysis testing system This device performs the thermoelasticity stress analysis by using the thermography.
  • Magnetic force microscope This device performs a magnetic structure at the atom and the nano-level.

Advanced processing machines

These are devices that processes various materials.

  • Electromagnetic forming machine This device performs high-speed plastic deformation and joining by using the electromagnetic force generated
  • Laser-based directed energy deposition fabricated by AIST (Laser DED) Fine structure fabrication of parts was built by this metal printing system.

Facilities for matrials processing

Equipments that processes materials under specified processing conditions

  • Crank press Maximum pressing load: 20 tons
  • Hot rolling machine Maximum roll temperature: 300 degreeC
  • Spark plasma sintering machine Maximum sintering temperature: 2000 degreeC under vacuum
  • High frequency melting machine for Magnesium Maximum melting temperature: 700-800 degreeC under an inert gas atmosphere
  • Desktop press Fine pressing for small parts

Evaluation facility

Equipment for evaluating material properties

  • Micro indentation tester Indentation load: 0-100mN