JEC Forums have returned for the fourth time in Boston this September to focus on the application of composite materials in aeronautics and the automotive industries.

As planes and cars use composites extensively, all the key products present in these transportation-based topics take advantage of the many properties of composites materials.

The first day of the Forum focused on design, optimization and simulation, while the second day underlined mass production and cost-reduction of composites in aeronautics and automotive. The two-day forum also organised networking sessions over the two days with table-tops exhibitors and a JEC Leardership Circle dedicated to Simulation.

Design optimization

For a long time, composites were used as black metal, following the method of considering a metal component’s geometry and simply replacing that material. This approach, however, causes a number of issues that make it impractical: during the design, composites structures require more consideration than equivalent metal ones in order to be used to their full potential.

With speakers from CETIM, Chomarat, Composites Agency, Dassault Systèmes, GSEa Design, and Stanford University, this delved into the optimization of this first and crucial step in concept development.

Combining speed and accuracy

Predicting the behaviour of composite materials without actually manufacturing the part is an important endeavour, since it can save significant amounts of funds. With several industries leaning towards mass production, speed is of the essence but accuracy can’t be sacrificed in the process.

To this effect, simulation tools need to provide with a global view: from virtual design to virtual testing, and then on to virtual manufacturing. The topic was explored by speakers from CompoSIDE, GE Global Research Center, and Stanford University.

Aeronautics industry

For the last few decades, the aeronautics market has become a major opportunity for the composites industry. With the automotive industry quickly evolving towards high production rates and lowered costs, the challenge is still up in the air for the aeronautics world. The reason behind this is that the less costly, mass produced parts that could possibly be used in aircrafts need to meet the subsequent requirements that are much rigorous in the aeronautics industry: strength, stiffness and damage tolerance, etc.

This session looked at all the questions and possible solutions the industry is working on, with speakers from Altair Engineering, e-Xstream, MIT, and Surface Generation.

Cost-competitive solutions for mass production

Composites materials have been present in the mainstream automotive industry for a while now, but one of the biggest challenges they face is the transition to high volumes of production. These days, the automotive industry is the largest consumer of composite materials, accounting for over 20% of total consumption.

Currently, most of the composite parts that are produced are too expensive for mass production because of the cost or raw materials and the lengthy production time. This session covered how the industry is planning on overcoming these obstacles, with the help of speakers from CETIM, Coriolis Composites, Dieffenbacher North America, IACMI, SGL Group, and TUM.

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