Brightsky visits Perron 038
Perron 038 is an open innovation centre, located in a former train workshop next to Zwolle station, and focussing on innovation for the high-tech manufacturing industry. Perron 038 was founded by a consortium of local manufacturing companies and, besides accelerating R&D, it has the goal of showing students the inspiring challenges they can work on in their local region. At the end of last year, Perron 038 acquired a new cold spray system. As cold spray is one of the key technologies being developed in Brightsky, and with our cold spray system nearing delivery, that seemed like a great opportunity for a visit!
And so, on a cloudy Tuesday morning in March, the members of the Brightsky Cold Spray Team (EPCOR, KLM E&M, HvA, NLR and TU Delft) made their way to Zwolle, where we were warmly welcomed by a team from Perron 038 and the Windesheim University of Applied Sciences (one of the partners in Perron 038). After an overview presentation showing the philosophy and activities of Perron 038, we went on a tour of the facilities, getting to see an impressive variety of equipment paving the way for the future of manufacturing. Of course, the highlight of the tour was the cold spray system.
Perron 038 has purchased a medium-pressure cold spray system, which is the same as the one that will be used within the Brightsky project. At Perron 038 this system has been mounted on a robot arm, combined with a moveable turntable, allowing for very complex spray paths – which also turns out to be one of the challenges of this installation: how to program the robot arm to follow the right path. In keeping with Perron 038’s open innovation philosophy, the system has been installed in a sound-proof booth with a glass wall, as you can see in the accompanying photographs.
After the tour, we exchanged mutual ambitions for the development of cold spray applications, and some of the challenges Perron 038 has uncovered in their first months of operation. All involved agreed that there is great potential to collaborate and learn from each other, as we both set our first steps in working with this new technology.
As we in Brightsky get our own cold spray system up and running this spring, we look forward to learning by doing and where possible sharing our experiences, to unlock the benefits of cold spray for the wider community. Curious about what we will achieve? Keep following Brightsky to stay up to date!
