Case Histories- An Introduction
The case histories provided below are meant to be illustrative of the power of our analysis capabilities to solve materials problems. They are not meant to be fully representative of our usual analysis projects. This is a necessity since most of our work is proprietary, whether we have signed a non-disclosure agreement with a client or not. As a consequence, the case history analyses provided here are less likely to be of novel materials under presently dynamic development. The problems are often those of everyday, mundane materials, which nonetheless can have problems that can benefit from high-powered materials analysis and testing.
Some of these case history examples are literally ginned up by us to serve as examples of what our analysis techniques can do. Some are analyses of natural minerals, which can be quite complex, but are clearly not anyone’s intellectual property. Others are picked from projects clients have paid for on products or materials in which they have no vested interest other than getting others to address the problem they encountered on buying a product or service. Most of our analytical work is performed for manufacturing companies and that work is greatly under-represented in these examples for proprietary reasons. Work performed for private residential issues is very much over-represented as well.
Generally there are no references in these case histories to the client or even to the maker or provider of the material with a problem. Problems happen and honorable, conscientious companies address those problems. There are only a couple of cases of egregious misconduct where the name of the company making the problem product or material or its brand name may appear. In none of those cases was that company our customer.
It is our hope that some of these illustrative examples of case histories will show you how our analytical capabilities can be applied to learning those characteristics and materials properties you need to know about your materials to produce reliable, safe, profitable, and mission-capable products.
- Ceramic Powder Identification on Floor Tile
- Complex Chemical Phase Analysis – Feldspar
- Complex Oxide Elemental Analysis – Emerald
- Corrosion Deposit on Hip Implant
- Cracking and Yellowing Cubic Zirconia Ceramic
- Defective Ceramic Floor Tile Glaze
- Exposure Testing for Materials Selection
- Failure of a Tempered Glass Window by Spontaneous Fracture
- FTIR Analysis of Products Formed from Overheating a Silicone Material
- FTIR – Distinguishing the 4H and 6H Polytypes of SiC Single Crystals
- Gemstone Coating Claims Critically Examined
- Glass Discoloration and Cracking
- Graphitic Corrosion in Grey Cast Iron
- Honey: A Complex Organic Chemical Mixture Analysis by GC-MS
- Inclusions in Steel
- Intergranular Corrosion
- Lead in a Ceramic Dinner Plate – Evaluating the Safety Hazard with XRF and XPS Analysis
- Optical Coating Degradation Problems
- Polyethylene Fiber XPS Surface Analysis
- Polymer Analysis of Fiberglass Reinforced Nylon-6 Pellets for Injection Molding
- Polymer Heat Sealing Problem
- Purity of a Calcium Carbonate Sample
- Reflective Coating Deposition Problem
- Sensitization of 304 Stainless Steels
- Shear strength test of epoxy adhesive bonded 316L stainless steel
- Silicone Detection on the Surface of an Acrylic Adhesive/Polyimide Tape Using XPS Analysis
- Soil-Side Chloride-Induced Stress Corrosion Cracking Under Insulation
- Surface Chemistry of a Silicon Oxynitride Film
- Surface Contamination Investigations
- Urine Identification by FTIR
- Vascular Stent Corrosion Resistance