Porcher Industries has been working with Stelia Aerospace, headquartered in Toulouse, France, on the development of a thermoplastic – as opposed to thermoset – composite fuselage for next generation single aisle aircraft.

A demonstrator of the part, featuring all the typical characteristics of a primary fuselage airframe – a thin skin, lightning protection, stringers and frames – was exhibited at the recent Paris Airshow. A detailed evaluation of the part in a true industrial environment is now being carried out.

Stelia has invested several million Euros in the Arches Box TP research and technology project within the CORAC (French Strategic Advisory Board for Civil Aviation Research) platform and manufactured the demonstrator skin with an automatic fibre placement (AFP) process using thermoplastic slit carbon tapes and out of autoclave (OOA) consolidation, before completing the final structure assembly at its in-house R & T centre in Méaulte, France.

Read the full article on our Inside Composites website