Process of manufacturing seal members having a low friction coefficient

Claim 1

A pair of cooperating seal members for use in a faucet valve to control the fluid flow through the faucet, the faucet valve including at least one fluid inlet, a fluid outlet and a fluid passageway therebetween, said seal members disposed in said fluid passageway, one of said seal members slidably movable relative to the other of said seal members to selectively control fluid flow from the inlet, through the fluid passageway past said seal members to the fluid outlet of the faucet valve, said seals comprising: a formation base formed of a material having a moderate hardness coefficient suitable to be ground to a precise finish, said base materials selected from the group consisting of stealites, ceramic materials, metal materials and synthetic materials; and at least one of the formation bases of said seals being coated with a layer of material having a hardness coefficient substantially greater than said base selected from the group consisting of silicium carbides, metal carbides, metal nitrides, and cubic crystallographic lattice carbons, said coating being applied through a process chosen from physical vapor deposition and chemical vapor deposition; wherein the surface of one of said pair of seals has a different coefficient of friction than the contact surface of the other of said pair of seals such that adhesion between said contacting surfaces of said seals is eliminated whereby the different coefficients of friction of the contacting surfaces between said seals facilitates sliding movement of one of said seals relative to the other of said seals within the faucet valve to selectively control fluid flow past said seals.