[3AngelaD]

What is this composite material made of and is it safe. When I saw this story on TV, I wondered how it could be a safe as metal. Do any of our engineering people have more information about this?

[gjones77]

It’s a carbon fiber composite, lighter and strong then steel, perfectly safe.

[Dead Dog]

Mil-Hndbk-17 or mmpds, google on those.

[VOA]

What is this composite material made of and is it safe.

I'm not an engineer, but have just read "Boeing Versus Airbus" by
John Newhouse.
"It's a small world after all" as I just read the section on
Boeing's wide-scale introduction of composites in the 7E7, aka 787.

According to the book, the one real POTENTIAL problem with
the composite is what is called "ramp rash"...damage caused when
airport flight line vehicles (such as de-icing machines) might
bump into the composite materials...causing "honeycombing" within
the interior layers of the composite materials.

This sort of injury can be difficult to detect as oppossed to
accidental injury to standard aluminum (alloy) material used today.

BUT...if Airbus uses similar composites for parts like the tail of
some of their planes, it probably just means that there will be improved
standards at airports to avoid "ramp rash" and the possibility of
resultant "honeycombing".

Despite the mis-steps of Boeing detailed in the book, I suspect they've
"stolen a march" on Airbus and that Boeing's work-product with
composites will result in a safe and lighter-weight (more efficient)
generation of airliners.

And don't be suprised when Airbus rushes to turn out airliners
with plenty of composites in not only the tail, but in the fuselage of
their planes...in a desperate attempt to catch up again with Boeing.
Once their technical staff is released from labors on the A380.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

Raytheon Aircraft Company (i.e., Beechcraft + Hawker) has been building composite business jets and propeller airframes for years.

[Rummenigge]

Carbon fibre composites - and they are safe if applied and produced correctly.

This stuff is used in lightweight constructions because it can take more load per weight then steel.

Other then steel it doesn’t bend or transform. If CFCs are destroyed they crack or even pulverize - this property is used in the manufacturing of racing cars to absorb a lot of energy in case of a crash.

With Airplanes it’s certainly all about the weight and - about the prevention of cracks and the pulverizing part ;-)

The production is quite high techy because the large parts of the fusilage have to be molded with nearly no tolerances - and with no bubbles between the carbon fibre layers. So far there’s no other company capable of doing that. Boeing is believed to have a 5 year head start on airbus with the manufacture of these parts although Boeing didn’t have much experience with composites in jet-liners before this project.

So this is a daring and remarkably global project (2/3 not from the US - wings from japan )

... and the safety regulations for aircraft are quiet strict so certainly it will be safe.

[InterceptPoint]

We need a picture.

[AntiKev]

I really wonder what the general public thinks about composites with all the bad press from Airbus. We have a joke in my circle of friends “Friends don’t let friends fly plastic airplanes.” But it is only a joke. There are companies such as Diamond Aircraft and Cirrus Design that have been producing composite aircraft for years. They have one big advantage in that you can fabricate large structural panels in one piece that you can’t out of aluminium. Yeah, Airbus developed friction-stir welding, but that can only do so much. You can only make a sheet of metal so big before it’s too big to handle.

I like to put it this way, carbon fibre and fibreglass are in the same material class as concrete :D:D. (Yeah, I’m simplifying things.) But the principles are the same. You have a resin and a substrate, the civil engineers like to use the terms binder and aggregate, different name, same idea. The idea is you have a cloth woven from either graphite or glass fibers. When you apply the adhesive (resin) properly, and without air pockets, the material dries to form and is hard as a rock. This has one major disadvantage. The strengths of these materials lie in the fact that they’re made up of interwoven strings, so if you break some strands, you significantly weaken the material. That’s where they must be careful in ground handling.

[GBA]

Carbon fiber has been used to build all sorts of airplanes. It is very strong, though it isn’t always lighter than aluminum and/or steel, depending on where it’s used. But, if constructed correctly, then it is very, very strong. Plus, you can much more easily shape it into all sorts of complex curvy shapes and designs.

Fiberglass boats and surfboards are an early example of this type of technology. However, newer carbon fiber, stronger resins and improved constructions techniques (large autoclaves to bake the carbon fiber) have gone way beyond fiberglass for light weight, strength and the ability to maintain strength through out all temp. ranges.

Also? The FAA is a very pragmatic bunch asn was very slow to embrace composite construction. Raytheon (Beechcraft) had to jump through lots of hoops to get approval for their Starship.

[UnklGene]

How many people do we have to squeeze in here?