Design & Tooling

Aerospace 1 Sep 2014

Software update: Materials database support for simulation/analysis

Another piece of the software integration puzzle in the aerospace world is finding ways and means to incorporate into the design process data from existing materials databases.

Construction 1 Sep 2014

MIT researchers reveal how bonded joints fracture and fail

Moisture reportedly plays crucial role.

Workforce Development 1 Sep 2014

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).

Materials Testing 1 Sep 2014

The evolution of the modified D 695 compression test method

HPC's Testing Tech columnist Dr. Donald F. Adams,the president of Wyoming Test Fixtures Inc. (Salt Lake City, Utah), looks at the long metals-to-plastics-to-composites history of this well-used and much modified compression test method.

Infrastructure 11 Aug 2014

Modeling fabric materials for better parts

Multiaxial fabric maker Formax is involved in a multi-year endeavor to simulate the behavior of dry fabrics during the molding process.

Molds/Tools 1 Aug 2014

Composites business does grow on trees

This advanced composites contractor welcomes down-to-earth opportunities to bring aerospace quality to fantasy foliage.

Aerospace 16 Jul 2014

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.

Materials Testing 1 Jul 2014

Extending robotic NDT to aerospace certification

Automating current manual testing promises increased speed, reduced cost, earlier damage detection and more detailed analysis of damage growth.

Autoclave 1 Jul 2014

Low-rate layup tools made cost-effective with high-density polyurethane foam blocks

Nemesis Air Racing, an air racing team and kit-plane company owned and operated by Jon and Patricia Sharp, use prebonded closed-cell, polyurethane foam blocks to build the Nemesis NXT.