Jun 18, 2012 
Based in Johnstown, Para-Coat Technologies works primarily with defense contractors, but now it said it has come up with a product that will protect everyday electronics from water damage.
Krista Rager and her husband, Michael Rager, own and run the company. They said they've come up with a new protective coating that can take a cellphone and make it waterproof from the inside out. They used their own phone as a demonstration.
"Basically, we started out with a parylene conformal coating, which is all done in a vaccum deposition chamber," said Krista Rager. "It starts out as a solid material, switches to a vapor, and then it goes on to the sub straight."
The couple has developed a new product they said has the potential to turn heads across the world.
"It's called Vapor Armor, and that's a nanotechnology that actually waterproofs cellphones, tablets, keyboards, cameras, and the response has just been huge," said Krista Rager.
They gave 6 News a demonstration Wednesday of how Vapor Armor works. Michael Rager poured water over his iPhone.
"There's no case on the outside of the phone. There's nothing in the charging ports. There's nothing in the speaker ports, so the water actually flows through the interior of the phone," said Michael Rager. "The whole inside of the phone has been coated."
He said it's the same phone he used for demonstrations at Showcase for Commerce two weeks ago, and the phone still works perfectly.
"A lot of people walked by our booth and saw what we were doing with cellphones, and they were just blown away by the technology," said Krista Rager.
The couple hopes to sell the product directly to manufacturers and make water protection another step along the assembly line.
"We've had some very large manufacturers contact us trying to get this into their manufacturing line," said Krista Rager. "If that takes off, I don't know what's going to happen. It's going to be crazy."
