Low cost composite materials for aeronautic applications: materials development and durability issues

21世纪世纪，新型飞机和喷气式客机的复合材料显著增加，波音787的复合材料将达到50%。相比之下，波音777只有约9%的复合材料。空客工业公司也在遵循同样的战略。降低复合材料的成本成为飞机制造商的主要目标。根据波音/NASA的成本分摊项目，预计将树脂灌注工艺（也称为真空辅助树脂灌注或瓦里）与一类新的树脂相结合，将使部件成本降低50%，并由于卓越的长期耐用性和损伤容限而减少维护。然而，这些低成本工艺和新树脂系统最具挑战性的问题是通过鉴定过程以证明符合适用的联邦航空法规。拟议研究的长期目标是开发制造、质量控制、机械测试和断裂分析领域的方法，使加拿大航空工业能够降低复合材料结构的总体实施和鉴定成本。为了实现我们的目标，我们将利用先进的通用航空技术实验（AGATE）财团提出的方法，该财团得到了联邦航空管理局（FAA -美国）的支持。从长远来看，加拿大工业预计将从对瓦里制造工艺和作为这项工作一部分调查的复合材料系统的性能的深入了解以及在这一战略领域培养高素质人才中获得重大利益。 虽然为航空航天结构制造商提供了特殊的成本优势，但这些信息将直接适用于大范围的其他工程结构，包括大型地面运输、海军结构和风力涡轮机。

The 21st century is seeing an outstanding increase in composites for new aircraft and jetliners as the Boeing 787 which will be 50% composite. In contrast, the Boeing 777 is only about 9% composite. Airbus Industries is also following the same strategy. Lowering the cost of composites became the primary target of aircraft manufacturers. Under a Boeing/NASA cost-shared project, it is forecasted that combining the resin infusion process (also named Vacuum Assisted Resin Infusion or VARI) with a new class of resins will reduce the component costs by 50 percent and reduce maintenance due to the exceptional long-term durability and damage tolerance. However, the most challenging issue with these low cost processes and new resin systems is to get through the qualification process to demonstrate compliance to the applicable Federal Aviation Regulations. The long term objective of the proposed research is to develop methodologies in the fields of manufacturing, quality control, mechanical testing and fracture analysis which enable the Canadian Aeronautic Industry to reduce the overall implementation and qualification cost of composite structures. To achieve our objectives we will make use of the methodologies proposed by the Advanced General Aviation Technology Experiments (AGATE) consortium which is supported by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA -USA). In the longer-term picture, Canadian industry is expected to derive significant benefits from the developed understanding of the VARI manufacturing process and the performance of the composite systems investigated as part of this work and also from the formation of highly qualified personnel in this strategic field.  While providing particular cost advantages for aerospace structures fabricators, this information will be directly applicable to a wide range of other engineering structures including large ground transportation, naval structures, and wind turbines.