he WPC process was applied...
he WPC process was applied to bearings with this increase in load bearing capacity. Greatly reduced bearing wear was also noted in the test.
These properties make WPC an excellent process for treating cylinder bores, pistons, rings, wristpins, gears, and anywhere reduced friction can help. Test data by a major OEM manufacturer has shown that WPC treatment of pistons can reduce friction and wear of pistons by twofold over the best skirt coatings. Recent testing by a major forged performance piston manufacturer has also shown WPC to be more effective to the reduction of skirt wear and scuffing over any coating presently on the market.
WPC treatment of bearings has also shown to be very beneficial. Even though bearings are made of soft metals like aluminum, lead, tin, and zinc, they can be WPC treated with no change in dimension. The treated bearing shows a reduction in friction and an improvement in fatigue strength to where their load bearing capacity has improved from 20 to 50 percent.
WPC treatment has proven to work well on solving problematic transmission issues as well. WPC can obviously be applied to the gears and shafts. It can also be applied to cases and housings. WPC has found that some cases of transmission gear failure in some cars can be traced to flex in the transmission case, which allows the gears lash to change under load. WPC treating the case reduces this and transmission life is improved. Take note of this for your transfer case Evo owners. DSM owners and builders of the WRX and Sentra SE-R should pay attention here as well.
The only drawbacks to WPC are that it's much more expensive than shot peening and there is currently only one place in the country doing it. Although it is still relatively inexpensive for the multiple benefits it provides with its improvement of fatigue strength, reduction of friction, and improvements in wear resistance, and it's cheaper than coatings.
We have used both shot peening and WPC extensively on our race and project cars and found these processes to save us a lot of money in parts failure and maintenance, as well as reducing our DNF rate in racing.
Superior Surface Finish
Surface imperfections exposed to high cyclic stress loading lead to pitting, fretting, and crack initiation. During the WPC treatment process surface imperfections such as microcracks and micropores are effectively removed. This leads to a finish unrivalled by conventional alternatives.
Although the WPC process is usually invisible to the naked eye, under a microscope, the low-friction, tough, microdimpled surface is apparent. This surface is formed with no change in dimensions or distortion in the part. The surface also removes stress risers caused by machining or other forming processes.
It is well known that nearly all fatigue failures propagate at the surface. The superior surface hardness of WPC treated parts is a result of a localized energy release. This causes the matrix of the metal component to form a more compact nano - crystalline structure. Crack iniation is considerably reduced once parts have been treated.