Novel process for manufacturing Higher performance And LOwer cost synthetic industrial diamond (HALO)

工业加工过程，如切割、研磨、抛光、钻孔和拉丝，需要坚固的机械性能，才能进行耐用、多产和精密的加工。工业钻石的性能是通过钻石磨损距离来衡量的。磨损距离是衡量钻石部件在磨损前能够有效加工的材料量。钻石的磨损距离取决于钻石的性能，如硬度、断裂韧性和耐热性以及加工工艺条件。全球133.8亿美元的工业钻石市场主要由广泛可用的合成单晶和多晶钻石来满足。这两种人造钻石的机械性能差异很大，每种类型都有自己特定的性能属性和限制。日本住友公司开发了一种具有优异机械性能的新型合成聚晶钻石材料，解决了商业工业钻石的局限性。然而，这种最先进的钻石材料还没有商业化，因为它不能用传统的生产方法进行商业批量生产。在这个项目中，我们将进一步开发我们创新的、正在申请专利的钻石处理单元和钻石合成工艺，以实现这种最先进的合成聚晶钻石的商业规模批量生产。一旦我们建立了新的生产流程，我们将与真正的工具最终用户进行性能评估。我们的颠覆性方法使用热膨胀来实现所需的超高工艺压力。与传统的生产方法相比，这使我们能够生产6倍于每个工艺单元的钻石量。此外，由于我们工艺单元的紧凑性(大约比传统设备小200倍)，我们可以并行热处理10个单独的工艺单元，将我们的产量提高到完全商业规模。这种新的、最先进的合成聚晶钻石材料的优势是众所周知的，并在全球工业钻石市场上备受追捧。我们独特的生产方法将释放其商业可用性。这个项目的成功交付将确保我们第一个进入市场，推出这种优质的英国制造的工业钻石产品。随着生产规模的扩大，我们将通过我们的全球钻石经销商E.I.D.有限公司分销我们的新产品。

Industrial machining processes such as cutting, grinding, polishing, drilling, and wire-drawing require mechanically robust diamonds for durable, productive and precise machining. Industrial diamond performance is gauged by diamond wear distance. Wear distance is a measure of the amount of material a diamond component can process effectively before wearing out. Diamond wear distance is dependent on diamond properties such as hardness, fracture toughness and (friction) heat resistance and the machining process conditions.The US$13.38B global industrial diamond stone market is mainly addressed by widely available synthetic single crystal and polycrystalline diamonds. The mechanical properties of these two synthetic diamond types differ significantly, with each type having its own specific performance attributes and limitations.Sumitomo Corp. in Japan have developed a new, synthetic polycrystalline diamond material with exceptional mechanical properties, which addresses the limitations of commercial industrial diamonds. However, this state-of-the-art diamond material is not commercially available, since it cannot be manufactured in commercial volumes using conventional production methods.In this project, we will further develop our innovative, patent-pending diamond process cell and diamond synthesis process for commercial scale volume production of this state-of-the-art synthetic polycrystalline diamond. Once we establish our new production process, we will conduct performance assessments with real tool end-users.Our disruptive approach uses thermal expansion to achieve the required ultra-high process pressures. This enables us to produce 6x the amount of diamond per process cell, compared to conventional production methods. Furthermore, owing to the compact nature of our process cell (approximately 200x smaller than conventional equipment), we can thermally process 10 individual process cells in parallel boosting our production volumes to full commercial scale.The advantages of this new, state-of-the-art, synthetic polycrystalline diamond material are well known and much sought after in the global industrial diamond market. Our unique production approach will unlock its commercial availability. Successful delivery of this project will ensure we are first to market with this superior, UK manufactured, industrial diamond product. Following production scale up, we will distribute our new product via our global diamond distributors E.I.D. Ltd.