The renaissance of composites in aerospace continues in all sectors, with hypersonics, energy storage, space, unmanned air vehicles and decarbonization taking center stage alongside the more established areas of defense aerospace and commercial aviation.
This revitalization has been enabled by high-efficiency manufacturing processes (including automated tow placement, automated contour following nondestructive evaluation, large-structure manufacturing, accelerated and out-of-autoclave curing processes, and thermoplastics). More recently, the effort has been bolstered by digital twins, additive manufacturing (AM) and sustainable circular economy processes such as recycling.
Composites have enjoyed decades of use across various industries. In the early 1940s, Henry Ford demonstrated the impact resistance of soy-based composites by hitting a car trunk with a sledgehammer. Today, composites are found in myriad applications that require high performance, low energy consumption and low systematic costs. This is evident in many defense aerospace programs and aviation, including the Boeing 787, Airbus 350 and Cirrus SR-22.
Composite use continues to expand in space and ground transportation with overwrapped pressure vessels for energy storage and transport. Even higher volumes are projected in unmanned aerial vehicles, which can reach build rates of more than 100 aircraft a month.
The obstacles that lie ahead are not whether composites will be used, but whether manufacturers can efficiently produce enough of them to meet demand. Notwithstanding the challenges of increased output, the industry must also ensure that products are properly certified, a metric that is mature in many sectors but still evolving in others. Energy storage of hydrogen in composite overwrapped pressure vessels for transportation and storage on-site and in-vehicle today undergo strict certification regulated by regional and local authorities internationally. This area continues to evolve with the emerging adoption of hydrogen energy in aviation. Unmanned aerial vehicles have great support from various committees, with participation by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration and other regulatory agencies to develop proper oversight.
There are evolving manufacturing spaces where composite manufacturing challenges are being addressed. Space flight has seen composites used for single-mission vehicles, as well as repeat uses—starting with the space shuttle and continuing today with commercial space operations. Hypersonics is an evolving technology area where composites play a key role to help enable operation in harsh service conditions.
Composite sustainability is a common theme globally, where the reduction of carbon footprint and, more importantly, decarbonization of process heating along with recycling, have been supported in all major industrial countries. This is especially true in the United States with the passage of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and the Inflation Reduction Act in 2022.
These challenges are being met with the evolution of AM for specialized applications and digital twins, allowing for more efficient, reliable and less costly composites manufacturing. This is especially needed as demand increases, pushing the limits of carbon-fiber production capability while new lines and composite-material manufacturing are established.
The additive manufacturing of composites allows for specialized parts and tooling, especially when the supply chain for higher volumes may not support their production.
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