CW Blog

Spoke Materials Inc. (Indianapolis, Ind., U.S.), a new resin technology company has acquired a line of molding and casting resins, structural adhesives, and pastes and putties originally developed by Mirteq Inc. (Fort Wayne, Ind., U.S.). Spoke is improving and relaunching the advanced composite material to provide alternatives to traditional methods such as RTM, hand layup and infusion that use long fibers. According to Spoke Materials CEO Joe Locke, its MIR line of products can reduce labor, raw materials cost and decrease production time for many detailed parts as the products require no additional reinforcement or expensive tooling.

This blog gives an update to the Clean Sky 2 Multifunctional Fuselage Demonstrator (MFFD), which has changed somewhat from my last writing in 2018. One of three large fuselage demonstrators to be assembled by 2022 and then tested through 2023, MFFD is an 8-meter long fuselage barrel that will be made from welded thermoplastic composites.

Within MFFD, there are dozens of individual projects and work packages. Two at the forefront are STUNNING (SmarT mUlti-fuNctionNal and INtegrated thermoplastic fuselaGe), which will develop and manufacture the lower half of the MFFD, and MECATESTERS (Micro mEchanical Characterization of A ThErmoplastic Co-conSolidated/welded joinT for usE in aiRcraft fuSelages), which is part of STUNNING.

The Institut de Soudure Group (IS Groupe, Villepinte, France) — literally “the welding institute” of France — has more than 100 years of experience in welding metals and is now establishing itself as a leader in welding thermoplastic composites. As reported in CW’s 2018 feature “Welding thermoplastic composites”, IS Groupe and its composites brand Composite Integrity developed the “dynamic induction welding” process used to join carbon fiber (CF)/polyetherketoneketone (PEKK) unidirectional (UD) tape stringers and fuselage skins in the “Arches TP” demonstration project with Airbus Tier 1 supplier STELIA Aerospace (Toulouse, France), which was unveiled at the 2017 Paris Air Show.

As manufacturers seek to simultaneously reduce cost and increase rate for composite parts production, the ability to see inside molding processes in real time and monitor resin flow, viscosity, temperature, pressure and Tg/state of cure becomes a differentiator. Synthesites (Uccle, Belgium) has developed this ability. Based on results reported by the German Aerospace Center (DLR, Stade) and the National Composites Centre (NCC, Bristol, U.K.), this technology has the potential to cut cycle times by up to 50%, with cure decisions based on Tg and degree of cure per resin and part vs. conservative time periods based on generic material studies. It is, in fact, progress toward Composites 4.0 production, using data from sensors to control processes and equipment, and also to improve simulation and design.