Ginger Gardiner

Ginger Gardiner Senior Technical Editor

Construction

AIA 2014 Convention report

The ACMA helps American Institute of Architects launch Composites Pavilion at Chicago convention.

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BMI

PCB environmental concern: Hit and miss

Efforts to eliminate substances deemed environmentally unfriendly by consumers have already had a significant impact on the printed circuit board (PCB) market.

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Medical

Printed circuit boards: A mobile market

Glass fiber/epoxy prepregs have dominated the mammoth PCB market for decades. Will that continue in a time of great change?

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Bio-prepreg guitar: The look, feel, acoustic quality of wood

When the El Capitan, a composite guitar from Blackbird Guitar (San Francisco, Calif.), made its debut this year with the look and sound of a vintage instrument.

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Carbon Fibers

Ultrasound evaluation of prepreg impregnation levels

The Ultran Group has developed non-contact ultrasound (NCU) that can accurately assess prepreg level of impregnation (LOI) with implications for out-of-autoclave processing, inline quality control and even automated tape laying.

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Thermoplastics

Leichtbau ist hybridbau

Integrating multiple materials and functions for lightweight construction in the German automotive industry.

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Aerospace

Automating the CH-53K’s composite flexbeams

Accudyne doubles the part production rate and eliminates layup errors through stepwise automation of this primary structure’s complex hand layup process.

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Adhesives

Camera-based ply placement cuts time, cost on complex rotorcraft parts

Applied Composites Engineering (ACE, Indianapolis, Ind.) uses PlyMatch ply placement technology from Anaglyph Ltd. (London, U.K.) to speed layup of the complex-shaped, heated inlet for a de-icing system on the AW169 helicopter, from AgustaWestland (Cascina Costa di Samarate, Italy).

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Carbon Fibers

Vibration-canceling composite technology

Materials Sciences Corp.'s new product might be a solution for aircraft interiors noise and shock mitigating boat hulls?

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Mass Transit

Voith to introduce new composites for rail

German innovator offers lightweight while the U.K. “is at materials crossroad” for High Speed Rail 2 set to start construction in 2017.

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Filament Winding

Hyperbaric chamber: Portable, pliable FRP handles pressure

Groupe Médical Gaumond Inc. (GMG, Terrebonne, Quebec, Canada) premieres HematoCare, its portable, collapsible composite hyperbaric chamber.

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Sustainability

Cutting time for composites design allowables

New approach by Dr. Stephen Tsai and Daniel Melo promises to reduce the required number of tests from 1,000 to mere dozens, providing results in days vs. months and at much lower cost.

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Quickly Make Molds, Tools and Fixtures
Composite raw materials
Alpha’s Premier ESR®
prepeg and slit tape products