Modular, robotic cells enable high-rate RTM using any material format

Airborne’s automated ply placement systems at Airbus, GKN Aerospace and Teijin Automotive Technologies aim to maximize flexibility and intelligent automation. 

The use of composite materials in vehicle and aircraft manufacturing is proliferating. This is due to their many benefits, such as light weight, strength, durability, corrosion resistance and design flexibility. As the demand for composite components in these industries continues to grow, so does the need for high-rate, high-accuracy, flexible, intelligent and modular manufacturing technologies to produce them. Composites manufacturing systems company Airborne (The Hague, Netherlands) set out to address this by creating a concept called automated ply placement (APP).

APP is a robotically operated, automated and modular preforming technology that maximizes composite component design and material freedom before resin transfer molding (RTM) processing. It represents the culmination of advancements in robotics, intelligent software and process optimization.

“APP allows engineers to design for optimal performance without the limitations of hand layup, thanks to the high accuracy of robotics and automation software,” explains Joe Summers, managing director of Airborne UK. “Automated ply placement was invented to improve accuracy, reduce waste and enable the use of composites in any format to be produced in automated manufacturing.”

Airbus Getafe A350 production

Airbus (Toulouse, France) employs Airborne’s APP at its Getafe, Spain production plant for the automated manufacture of preforms for the carbon fiber-reinforced polymer (CFRP) rear fuselage beams and maintenance door frame in what Airbus calls section 19 of the A350XWB airframe. The rear fuselage features a co-cured CFRP skin-stringer barrel  measuring 6 × 5 meters. The beam supports and doorframe are integrated as a single, co-injected RTM part — uniting two longerons, two lintels and four frame sections — measuring 3 square meters. 

Airborne faced several challenges in developing the APP system to meet this program's needs. First, the size of the parts were quite large. Thus, Airborne adapted the Airbus cell to handle preforms with a maximum size of 3.5 meters. The project also involved various ply shapes and multiple materials. Airborne's accompanying Automated Programming software technology was used to address these challenges (see “Automated Programming, composites 4.0” section later in this article). Finally, this system's production of dry fiber preforms with automated pick and place is a first for Airbus. Thus, Airbus is in the process of qualifying the APP technology and will support it to ensure compliance with production standards.

Future APP development, applications

Regarding APP’s future potential, Kremers says, “Software development is something we are constantly doing to improve the speed and robustness of the system, especially as the data we harvest has a lot of potential to provide more capability and performance for the customer. For example, now the system inspects every ply before placement. You can foresee the accuracy of plies that are directly picked from the cutter is quite decent, and the system only makes a minimal correction or none at all. If the system recognizes this trend, you could skip the inspection or reduce the frequency and inspect, for example, only one in every ten plies, improving the output.”

“Another example can be that there is a particular dependency on the material,” he continues. “Some materials are more difficult to cut and get clean edges than others, and the system can see this and provide insights on how to set up the cutter properly or to have a more frequent change of the cutting knives or use different cutting methods for other materials.” Additionally, there is material welding development in the software: if binder quality or quantity changes, the system can potentially recognize this from the welding data.