The National Composites Centre (NCC) has apprised about purchase of a multi-million pound Automatic Fibre Placement (AFP) machine, the first of its kind in the country.
The machine cost over 2½ million pound and was paid for with a 1.4m pound grant from the South West RDA (Regional Development Agency) through GKN Aerospace Industry as part of the Next Generation Composite Wing research programme, and a 1.2m pound grant from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF).
The AFP machine will be of vital importance to the work of the NCC in progressing the UK’s composite capabilities - exploring the manufacturing challenges facing many industrial sectors to help ensure the UK industrial base is prepared to face anticipated market requirements in the coming decades.
Conventionally, composites are hand laid up from plies which is very time consuming and can introduce problems with variability in the finished product. The AFP machine will be used to progress expertise in rapid, automated, material deposition - an area with huge potential benefit for future composites manufacture.
The AFP machine, supplied by Coriolis Composites (France), comprises two robotic arms, each with an AFP head. These arms work independently and cooperatively, rapidly depositing composite fibres in specific directions and to varying thicknesses to create highly accurate and repeatable composite structures.
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