JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #89 - May 2014 - 31

European Aviation Safety Association
(EASA) certification for the prototype to
prepare for a two-year flight test run on
an airliner, with a 5,000-hour objective.

Conclusion and prospects

CMC Arcoce plug on CFM5-5B engine on ground
test bench (Snecma Villaroche)

hours. Lightning strike tests were also
carried out to prepare for the potential
use of the demonstrator in flight. The
tests caused no major perforation or
damage of the ceramic matrix composite.

World first: going airborne
The plug was flight-tested on the Airbus
A320 MSN001 test aircraft soon after the
ground tests. A week-long series of flights
in icing conditions validated the viability
of the technology in a real environment
and of the plug's thermo-mechanical
resistance and its compliance with the
aircraft's operational performance. This
constitutes a world first: up to that point,
no part had been successfully tested on a
civilian aircraft.
The test flight series was just a foretaste
of the next stage: Herakles is now seeking

The importance of concurrent engineering for the engine appears obvious, given that it will help optimize the weight
savings. It is absolutely necessary to
avoid the "black metal syndrome", which
consists in trying to replace a metal part
by a CMC part without bothering to
review the overall design.
The material projects serve to identify
the best solutions for an industrial-scale
CMC afterbody, including process orientations that lead to lower production cost
and more reliable material service life.

The projects on the processes (excluding
gas phase densification) used in the
CMC plug production programme are
carried out in partnership with small
and medium-sized businesses. There is a
strong focus on the densification projects
in order to achieve the desired economic
gains, with a new design to cost approach
that factors in production equipment,
which accounts for much of the technology's cost.
The IRT St. Exupéry (a French technological research institute in aeronautics,
space and embedded systems) and its
CMC platform represent a tremendous
opportunity to further the maturing
process of the CMC technologies,
among which preforming, machining,
inspection, oxide densification, carbide
densification. n

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Beginners

Cure monitoring of thermo-setting resins with Dielectric Analysis (DEA)
IDEX sensor in
lab furnace for
DEA 288 Epsilon

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Formula development for resins
Cure optimization, e.g., during
composites manufacturing
Optimization of process parameters
Resin flow-front monitoring

NETZSCH-Gerätebau GmbH

No89 May 2014 /

More information:
www.safran-group.com
www.herakles.com

Feature Aeronautics

Curing insight

What is noteworthy about the Arcoce
programme is the progress made by the
partners towards mature, robust technologies in combination with a material,
Cerasep® A40C, for which the service life
potential corresponds to the requirements of the civilian aviation market.
The technical tests and the engine bench
tests for the demonstrator plug proved
the viability of the onboard technologies
and of the design criteria that were defined for the backup documentation.

Finally, the certification issues need to be
dealt with. This is a crucial task, because
the current EASA regulations include
organic matrix composites, but not ceramic matrix composites. Prototype certification will serve to establish a framework
for future guidelines on the subject.

jec composites magazine 31

http://www.safran-group.com http://www.herakles.com http://www.netzsch.com

JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #89 - May 2014

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #89 - May 2014