Contract Coating and Toll Coating Solutions

Contract coating and toll coating allow manufacturers to send tools, dies, punches, blades, or production parts to a specialized coating provider instead of handling coating in-house. Surface Solutions applies high-performance PVD coatings to improve wear resistance, reduce friction, extend tool life, and help production teams lower maintenance and sharpening frequency.

PVD coating is commonly used for cutting tools, punches, dies, sheet metal forming tools, injection molding components, medical parts, firearms, blades, carbide tooling, and manufactured wear parts. The best candidates are components exposed to abrasion, heat, friction, galling, chipping, or frequent maintenance during production.

PVD coatings can dramatically improve production efficiency by extending part life, reducing lubricant requirements, minimizing build-up, and lowering maintenance workload. Surface Solutions highlights results such as 6x more parts produced before resharpening, 48 hours of labor saved through reduced sharpening, and longer die run times without basic maintenance.

Surface Solutions offers multiple coating options, including TiN, TiCN, CrN, AlTiN, and Alpha coating. Each is suited to different production conditions, such as heat resistance, wear resistance, lower friction, reduced galling, or minimizing galvanized build-up. The right coating depends on your material, tooling, and performance goals.

Yes. Surface Solutions works with manufacturers across the United States, Canada, and Mexico. Customers can coordinate coating projects from many regions, including Minnesota, Wisconsin, the Upper Midwest, California, New York, and Florida, making it practical to outsource specialized PVD coating without operating an in-house coating line.

Alpha coating is designed to significantly delay basic sharpening compared with uncoated tools, reduce chipping of punches, and minimize galvanized build-up compared with TiN coating. It can also eliminate polishing in certain applications, saving time while improving part appearance and keeping tools working better than new after coating.

Turnaround depends on part type, quantity, coating selection, preparation requirements, and current production schedule. Surface Solutions emphasizes reasonable turnaround times for high-quality PVD coatings. To plan accurately, provide part details, base material, coating goals, deadlines, and any drawings or specifications when requesting a project review.

Surface Solutions can help evaluate the issue you are trying to solve, such as premature wear, chipping, excess heat, galling, lubricant use, or frequent sharpening. By matching the coating to the application, the team helps manufacturers target measurable improvements in tool life, productivity, maintenance workload, and finished product quality.