With a consortium of eight U.S. companies that includes automakers and aircraft engine manufacturers, researchers at Sandia National Laboratories are studying an emerging manufacturing technique called Cold Spray.
In Cold Spray, microscopic powdered particles of metal or other solids are injected into a supersonic jet of rapidly expanding gas and shot at a target surface. When these 10- to 50-micron particles hit the substrate, they splat so hard they stick--like a bug on a windshield.