Development of a digital methodology for composite process & manufacture in aerospace assemblies

The application of carbon fibre reinforced plastic composite as a material for primary structures in aircraft manufacture is becoming increasingly pervasive and represents a significant shift in design and manufacture strategies for original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) as they expand the appliance of new material systems and manufacturing methods for civil aerospace applications. The primary benefits of composite materials include excellent strength to weight properties, their versatility for the manufacture of complex geometries with fewer fasteners or seams, resistance to corrosion and fatigue. When sustainability is considered as a design driver, integrated methods for part design and product development must be developed so that any benefits of sustainable composite material systems can be assessed during the design process. Composite components can suffer from process induced stress and deformation and typical solutions involve the iterative development of processing configurations (including part geometry, material type and orientation, processing method, thermal history etc.) to arrive at the geometrical optimum before such parts are integrated into the final assembly. Further to this is a relative lack of methods related to the management of the processes required to derive a configuration which is optimal across disciplines. It is proposed in this paper that predictive techniques related to material specification, part processing and product cost, be integrated within a Through Life Management (TLM) product development methodology as part of a larger strategy of product system modeling to improve disciplinary concurrency. This paper reports the enhancement of digital manufacturing tools as a means of drawing simulated part manufacturing scenarios, real time costing mechanisms, and broader lifecycle performance data capture into the design cycle. The work demonstrates predictive processes for sustainable composite product manufacture and how a Product - Process - Resource (PPR) structure can be customised and enhanced to include design intent driven by 'Real' part geometry and consequent assembly.