Quality Assurance of Fuel Cells:
Line scan cameras verify the correct coating of bipolar plates
Customer Spotlight
Elcogen
Elcogen develops and supplies a proprietary solid oxide technology platform that operates in both fuel cell (SOFC) and electrolysis (SOEC) modes. It enables affordable green hydrogen production and zero-emission power generation.
Founded in 2001, the company has its registered office in the UK, its main headquarters in Tallinn, Estonia, and research and R&D centres of excellence in both Estonia and Finland.
The delivered system fully meets the requirements set. Lateral Engine successfully combined the requirement for the device’s compact size with the capability to inspect parts from both sides simultaneously, saving inspection time and thereby reducing the number of devices needed.
Considering the complexity of the developed system, getting it from order to production in 4 months was important to us.
Sebastian Matthews
Industrialization Engineer, Elcogen
The Challenge
For the longevity of the solid oxide stack, defect-free components and material layers play an essential role. One of the crucial components is a protectively coated ferritic stainless-steel interconnect (IC) that connects ceramic cells (elcoCell) in series, enabling 3kW stack configurations (elcoStack).
The vision system, built using Basler line scan cameras, monitors the coating integrity in ferritic stainless-steel components, thus ensuring the required quality for securing a longer lifetime of the stack. This is faster, more accurate, and more reliable than manual visual inspection, enabling increased production rates when moving toward megawatt production levels.
The Solution
Previously, Elcogen relied on the manual visual inspection of coated interconnect plates. The issue with this approach was that the quality and duration of the inspection depended on the individual. Now, by utilising a camera-based inspection system, the results are more reliable and reproducible, eliminating the possibility of human error.
The developed system enables simultaneous imaging of both sides of the coated components. This shortens the inspection time and simplifies the assessment of product quality. The designed product jig ensures seamless inspection of all product variants without the need for system modifications.
The Results
Improved production rate
Simultaneous two side imaging significantly speeds up the inspection time and thus production rate
Rapid deployment into production
From order to delivery in under 4 months, with commissioning completed in just 1 day
Increased production quality
Application-specific analytical algorithm engineered to eliminate human error, delivering unmatched precision and consistent repeatability
Compact size
Due to carefully selected imaging components and precision mechanical engineering, the device maintains an exceptionally compact footprint of just 78 cm × 35 cm × 30 cm
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