Two intensive days with twelve high-profile expert contributions, accompanied by reflective panel discussions and an engaged audience – that was Mahr's first High Performance Surface Summit. The 'Summit of Surface Function' was aimed at specialists and executives from research & development, production and manufacturing, quality assurance, and materials engineering – thus addressing all those who not only want to qualify technical surfaces but also understand and design them purposefully.
The first day of the event focused on tribological models, manufacturing processes, and modern metrology of high-performance surfaces. What characteristics define low-friction and low-wear workpiece surfaces, and how can they be reliably manufactured and quantified? 'Participants received highly interesting insights into the current state of research and education, new perspectives on characterization, and innovative measurement methods for state-of-the-art industrial requirements – from the most renowned professors in the field as well as excellent practitioners, practical and well-founded,' summarized Mahr CEO Manuel Hüsken. 'It was important for us to bring research, education, and practice into direct dialogue.'
Central questions included: 'What requirements are currently placed on functional surfaces and how can they be reliably characterized?' or 'What measurement, analytical, and model-based methods are currently available for this?'
The day concluded with a panel discussion titled 'Measurement Processes between Standards and Innovation,' moderated by Peter Ebert, editor-in-chief of the specialist magazine InVision.
The subsequent evening event at the 'Spitzbub-Almhütte' in Göttingen provided an opportunity for personal exchange and networking, accompanied by music and in the spirit of a traditional Oktoberfest.
Reproducibly manufacture and test high-precision surfaces
The second day of the event focused on the measurement of high-performance surfaces in industrial practice. The speakers addressed, among other things, the measurement requirements for sealing systems, the influence of steel surface topography on the tribology of ball joints, and the grinding of calender rolls. Other topics included the measurement of ball screw spindles in noise and efficiency-critical applications and their quantification using the scattered light method according to VDA 2009. Aspects such as knowledge management in the age of artificial intelligence and the presentation of a new surface model based on cylinder running surfaces also garnered great interest.
The event concluded with an open forum where participants and speakers discussed how functionally relevant surfaces can be reproducibly and cost-effectively manufactured and measured – and what role the combination of classical methods with the scattered light method as an innovative multisensory approach plays in this. The central question was how to bridge the gap between laboratory knowledge and industrial series production.
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