Tag: composite materials

Podcast Ep. #41 – Alpine Advanced Materials and the Ultralight Nanocomposite Material HX5™
In this episode I am speaking to Aaron Daniel and Peter Shpik of Alpine Advanced Materials. Alpine Advanced Materials specialises in the design and manufacture of custom-engineered parts and products for demanding aerospace and energy applications. The company is currently commercialising a high-performance material known as HX5™, which is a thermoplastic nanocomposite originally developed by Lockheed Martin Skunk Works® over a decade of testing and validation.

HX5™ was originally developed to replace aluminum at half the weight but with the same strength and stiffness. On top of that HX5™ has excellent durability in harsh environments such as in outer space, in radioactive settings or around aggressive chemicals. As a result, this new nanocomposite material is already being used on jet fighters, high-speed helicopters, UAVs, rockets, and satellites. In this episode of the aerospace engineering podcast Aaron, Peter and I talk about:
- the importance of lightweighting in the aerospace industry
- the development history of HX5™
- what exactly HX5™ is and its unique properties
- where and how HX5™ is currently being used
Selected Links from the Episode
- Alpine Advanced Materials webpage, Twitter & LinkedIn
- HX5™ white paper
- HX5™ case studies
- What is a nanocomposite?
September 25, 2020
Podcast Ep. #9 – Faradair Founder Neil Cloughley on the Bio-Electric Hybrid Aircraft and Regional Aviation
Neil Cloughley is the founder and managing director of Faradair, the UK’s leading hybrid aviation programme. Neil has a broad background in the aviation industry ranging from aircraft re-marketing and aircraft leasing to starting his own aircraft consultancy business, which found him working with the world’s major airlines, OEMs and trailblazing companies like Virgin Galactic. Neil’s father developed one of the most advanced unmanned aerial vehicles of the early 1990s, and had a flying prototype before the General Atomics MQ-1 Predator entered service in 1995. Unfortunately, as a result of being slightly ahead of its time, and due to a lack of funds and unfortunate timing, ASVEC UK had to close its doors.

Neil is now stepping into his father’s footsteps and building the bio-electric hybrid aircraft (BEHA) drawing from many of the lessons he learned from his father. The BEHA is a six-passenger aircraft with a hybrid gas and electric propulsion system, and is to be used for regional travel of around 200 miles. The BEHA has an unconventional design with a triple-staggered wing, an all-composite airframe and a ducted propeller. These design decisions reflect the three key specifications that need to be met to make regional inter-city flight a reality: minimising noise, emissions and operational costs. In this conversation, Neil and I talk about
- the engineering behind BEHA
- the challenging economics of new aviation businesses
- his long-term vision for a regional Uber-like taxi service in the sky
- and much, much more
Selected Links from the Episode
- Faradair and the BEHA
- Neil’s vision of an UBER in the sky
- The Journey of an Aerospace Startup — Royal Aeronautical Society lecture
- Profile of Neil Cloughley
- Faradair partnership with Swansea University
- ProDrive’s partnership with Faradair
April 25, 2018
Podcast Ep. #3 – Airbus Senior Expert Ian Lane on the A350, Innovation in Aerospace, and Diversity in Engineering
“You could say: What could we possibly do next? You look back at history and say: All the shelves must be full now! We must have the capabilities to do everything we need. And yet, we still go on…It’s your generation that is going to Mars. So please, can you get on with it and do it, because I want to enjoy it from the augmented reality that other engineers are going to produce.” — Ian Lane

This episode features Ian Lane, Senior Expert in Composite Analysis for Airbus UK. Ian has more than 40 years of experience in the aerospace industry and his career has taken him from British Hovercraft to British Aerospace, Westland Helicopters and finally to his current role at Airbus. On top of this broad aerospace background, Ian’s specialty are modern composite airframes and he was the lead stress engineer on the Airbus A400M and Airbus A350. Ian is also a Visiting Professor in Aerospace Engineering at the University of Bristol, and a great example of an industry leader who knows how to inspire the next generation of young engineers. Indeed, Ian is actively involved with the Airbus Fly Your Ideas campaign, and a regular attendee at many international research conferences.

In this episode Ian and I discuss:
- his career progression from apprentice to Senior Expert at Airbus
- the incredible safety record of the aerospace industry
- why the demise of Concorde wasn’t a step backwards
- how Airbus fosters innovation and out-of-the-box thinking
- why inclusion and diversity in engineering are so important
- and much, much more
Selected Links from the Episode
- Airbus in Bristol & Filton, UK
- British Hovercraft Company
- Westland Helicopters (for a time known as AugustaWestland and now Leonardo Helicopters)
- Sikorsky Crisis, also known as the Westland Affair
- British Aerospace (now known as BAE Systems)
- The EU TANGO project (overview slides)
- A400M and A350 airframes, and contrasts between the two
- Evolution of composite application at Airbus
- Airbus Helicopters NH90 and Tiger
- Bend-twist coupling in aircraft wings
- Clean Sky initiative
- New aerospace metallic alloys
- Additive manufacturing and bionic 3D printing at Airbus
- Aerospace testing pyramid and virtual testing
- Burt Rutan and Scaled Composites
- A picture history of aviation safety and the “anti-fragile” nature of aircraft design
- Concorde demise and the Concorde Museum
- Airbus Fly Your Ideas
- Diversity at Airbus, Diversity & Inclusion in Engineering
- Women of NASA Lego
- Evolution of flying machines
December 19, 2017
Podcast Ep. #1 – Dr Chauncey Wu on NASA, Rocket Science and Advanced Composite Materials
“If you’re trying to put these structures into orbit, every gram counts. Not just every pound but every gram…So you are making structures that are operating at their margins.” — Dr Chauncey Wu, NASA Langley Research Center

Today’s conversation features Dr Chauncey Wu, who is a research engineer at NASA Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia. Chauncey has worked at NASA for more than 30 years, predominantly in the field of structural mechanics, and has been responsible for designing and testing a number of space structures that have been launched into space. Some examples of his work include structural analyses on the LITE telescope that was launched into space in 1994, as well as the optimisation of rocket propellant tank structures, and conceptual design studies of lunar lander vehicles and habitat structures for the colonisation of the Moon. In this wide-ranging conversation, we discuss:
- Chauncey’s path to NASA as an undergraduate student
- The history of NASA and the cultural shift compared to its predecessor, the NACA
- The reason why rocket science is so hard
- Chauncey’s recent research on a new type of lightweight composite material: tow-steered composites, which could be a game-changer for rocket booster designs
- And much, much more
Selected Links from the Episode
- NASA Langley Research Center
- NASA Glenn, NASA Goddard, NASA Ames and NASA Marshall
- NASA co-op program
- The NACA (predecessor to NASA)
- Bob Gilruth, Chris Kraft
- Collier Trophy
- Low-Drag Cowling and Fred Weick
- John Stack, Larry Bell, Chuck Yaeger and the X-1
- Slotted-wall wind tunnel
- Richard Whitcomb, the Area Rule and the Supercritical Airfoil
- Science Office for Mission Assessments
- The safety factor
- The history of rocketry and a primer on rocket science and lightweight design
- Tow-steered composites (some further NASA research here and here)
- ISAAC
- Imperfection sensitivity of cylinders (the introduction of this paper conveys the message)
- Video of collapsing soda can and “scientific” crush test
- NASA Shell Buckling Knockdown Factor (video)
October 7, 2017