AVC class teaches composites tech

Valley Press ^ | July 4, 2004 | JULIE DRAKE

[BenLurkin]

LANCASTER -Antelope Valley College played host to educators and a few NASA Dryden Flight Research Center employees as part of a two-day workshop to demonstrate to the educators how to teach composites technology to their students. Composites are known to many in the "Aerospace Valley" as those materials that make the stealth bomber stealthy and SpaceShipOne a contender for getting a featherweight rocket ship into space.

Participants created B-2 bomber models out of shaped foam core and a carbon fiber outer skin. The resultant models measured about 16 inches tall and weighed less than a large apple.

The workshop was funded through a National Science Foundation grant titled SpaceTEC.

SpaceTEC grants promote standards for aerospace technicians and includes colleges in proximity with NASA centers such as Dryden.

By establishing a set of standards, aerospace technicians who have achieved certification within the standards would be able to travel from a job in one part of the country to a job in another state, and be able to pick up where they left off.

Faculty and administrators from Calhoun Community College in Alabama, Brevard Community College and Palm Beach Community College in Florida, Thomas Nelson Community College in Virgina, and, from California, Allan Hancock Community College in Santa Maria and College of the Canyons in Santa Clarita, participated in the workshop.

Brevard Community College in Florida is the lead campus in this effort.

"This composite workshop was very beneficial in learning techniques using hands-on experience," said Tom Pinto of Brevard Community College.

"It gave me the tools necessary to teach our future students the proper methods in composites. Excellent instructors and facilities," he added.

AV College was invited to participate in the program because of its proximity to NASA Dryden at Edwards Air Force Base, said Maggie Drake, dean of technical education at AV College.

She added the college will be a test administration site, though she yet doesn't know what that will entail.

The initial standards have been established and a test developed, she said.

"Now it's a matter of running the first batch of technicians through it and seeing, are we on track?" Drake said.

The test was developed after a three-year process with the participation of Brevard and other community colleges, the NASA centers, aerospace contractors and the U.S. Air Force.

The workshop was held in the composites laboratory in AV College's Technology Education building, the newest structure on campus. This laboratory supports classes for students wanting to learn aircraft fabrication techniques.

AV College began the Aircraft Fabrication Program in fall 2003 in response to the needs for well-trained employees for the aerospace industry.

"The Antelope Valley College composites workshop provided me with a unique, hands-on introduction to composites materials that will be invaluable to me as I develop a similar curriculum at my college," said Troy Tanner, an instructor at Thomas Nelson Community College.

Pete Bellas, who runs the Center for Applied Competitive Technologies at College of the Canyons, said he has studied composites for years but has never built anything with it.

"By the end of the first day, I learned enough to completely redesign and expand the rocketry program we instituted at our college," said Dr. Jon Saken, of>B> Palm Beach Community College, Fla.

"Our students will now be able to launch larger rockets carrying heavier payloads by constructing the rockets completely from composites," he added.

[snopercod]

You don't need no steenking government program to learn composites technology. Join the EAA.

Better yet, build your own kitplane.