A gasket that’s grown directly on the part rather than punched from a sheet and installed by hand — that’s the core shift behind Cure in Place Gaskets (CIPG), and it’s reshaping how engineers approach sealing from automotive engines to handheld electronics.
What Are Cure in Place Gaskets?
CIPG dispenses a liquid elastomer onto a component’s surface and cures it — typically via UV light, heat, or moisture — into a solid, resilient seal before final assembly. Unlike pre-cut rubber gaskets manufactured separately and installed manually, a CIPG bead is grown directly on the part and reaches a fully cured, non-tacky state before the mating component ever touches it. When the two halves are bolted together, the cured gasket compresses, filling every microscopic void to create a leak-proof barrier.
CIPG vs. FIPG
The two are easily confused despite sharing similar dispensing equipment. CIPG cures before assembly, creating a compression seal that’s easy to disassemble for maintenance. Form in Place Gaskets (FIPG) are dispensed wet, assembled while still liquid, and cure inside the joint — creating an adhesive bond that makes disassembly difficult without damaging the seal.
Material Chemistry
UV-curable acrylates and silicones dominate high-speed production, with photoinitiators reacting almost instantly to 365–405nm light for cure times measured in seconds and excellent green strength — the tradeoff being a line-of-sight requirement for the UV light to reach the material. RTV silicones cure via ambient moisture and offer excellent flexibility and thermal stability across roughly -50°C to 200°C. Polyurethanes bring exceptional toughness and abrasion resistance for heavy-duty environments with oil exposure or physical wear.
The Dispensing and Curing Process
Surface preparation removes machining oils, dust, and moisture that would interfere with initial wetting; plasma or corona treatment often boosts surface energy on plastic substrates for long-term adhesion. Automated dispensing systems then apply the bead with micron-level control over width and height — essential for the thin walls of an electronics enclosure or the intricate channels of an EV battery cooling plate. Curing follows immediately: UV LED lamp or mercury vapor bulb for light-cure systems, an infrared tunnel or convection oven for heat-cure. Vision-based quality inspection checks for slumping, breaks, or inconsistent bead height in real time, and because UV-cured gaskets finish instantly, inspection can happen immediately, cutting scrap rates.
Key Benefits
Stocking bulk liquid resin instead of thousands of pre-cut gasket shapes collapses inventory cost and eliminates warping-in-storage risk. Design flexibility opens up, since CIPG can follow complex 3D paths and varying heights that die-cutting simply can’t produce. Material efficiency improves dramatically — CIPG is additive, so nearly 100% of dispensed material ends up on the part, versus the significant “skeleton” waste from die-cutting. Sealing performance benefits too, since the liquid conforms to surface irregularities before curing more intimately than a pre-cured rubber piece ever could. And CIPG integrates naturally into Industry 4.0 automated lines, cutting labor and human error.
Critical Industrial Applications
Automotive and EV applications range from engine covers and oil pans to the surge in demand for sealing battery packs, power electronics, and sensor housings against moisture while managing thermal expansion. Electronics and telecommunications equipment — smartphones, tablets, outdoor 5G hardware — uses UV-curable CIPG to hit IP67/IP68 ratings with beads as thin as 0.5mm. Aerospace applications use CIPG for thinner flanges and lighter housings, plus specialized conductive formulations for EMI/RFI shielding around sensitive avionics. Industrial and consumer appliances with components that require periodic access — pump housings, control modules, dispenser units — benefit from CIPG’s easy-disassembly design as much as its seal quality. Email Us if you’re scoping a CIPG conversion for a specific housing geometry.
Design Considerations
Low compression set keeps the gasket “bouncing back” to its original shape over years of service rather than flattening out. A groove or land helps contain the bead during dispensing and protects it from over-compression or displacement during assembly. And some designs need the gasket to bond permanently on one side while releasing cleanly from the mating part, achieved through material choice or a release agent on the mating surface. Environmental exposure — UV light, ozone, salt spray, fuel — ultimately dictates the choice between acrylate, silicone, and polyurethane chemistry.
For related equipment background, see Incure’s UV LED flood lamp guide and UV cure chamber selection.
The Future: UV LED and Sustainability
UV LED curing is roughly 70% more energy-efficient than mercury vapor, produces no ozone, and runs cool enough for heat-sensitive plastic substrates — while lower-VOC, solvent-free resin formulations are reducing the environmental footprint of the sealing process industry-wide.
Conclusion
Cure in Place Gaskets combine robotic precision with fast-curing polymer chemistry to make sealing more reliable, efficient, and cost-effective than traditional die-cut gaskets, particularly as electric mobility and miniaturized electronics keep pushing design complexity higher. Incure supplies UV-curable and heat-cure elastomer systems engineered for CIPG dispensing lines, and our team can help validate material selection against your specific compression, temperature, and chemical-exposure requirements. Contact Our Team to discuss a CIPG solution for your assembly.
Visit www.incurelab.com for more information.