JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #79 - March 2013 - 51

Building & construction

High-energy-efficiency façade
panels based on composite profiles
As new European thermal insulation
regulations for building envelopes become
increasingly stricter (RT 2005 – 2012),
the best way to lower the energy needs of
buildings is through thermal insulation of
façade components. Current façade panels
made of aluminium profiles with embedded
polyamide thermal breaks will only meet the
lowest limits of these regulations. Moreover,
the use of conventional materials would
result in thicker and thicker wall constructions. This has driven Owens Corning and
its partners to study, design and plan the
industrialization of an incremental solution
targeting new and old buildings (fewer
than ten floor levels) that could meet new
thermal regulations.
The global panel solution, named COFAHE, is the result of a strong partnership
among key industrial players and is
composed of different parts and materials.
The profile component uses composites to
replace the PA thermal breaks and part of
the aluminium.

The main advantages of this composite
component are:
- an almost “ready-to-use” (panel) incremental solution with minimum changes in
existing technology and machinery, and no
change in the aesthetic aspect of the façade;
- lower thermal conductivity and better
insulation while keeping good mechanical
properties, thanks to the composite/aluminium combination;
- a solution that can evolve in the future to
meet the expected tightening of thermal
regulations, as opposed to current solutions,
which have reached their limits. Together
with Goyer, OC assessed the value that will
be created by replacing all their PA thermal
breaks with pultruded reinforced vinylester
(reinforced with Xstrand® H glass in this
case). The change is motivated by the improved mechanical properties and thermal
insulation.
Moreover, building contractors will be
able to sell larger living surfaces inside the
buildings using composite profiles combi-

Winner: Owens Corning (France)
Partnership Network: Ademe (France),
Exel Composites (Belgium), CSTB
(France), Goyer (France), Compositec
(France), ENPC (France)

ned with extremely thin vacuum-insulated
panels instead of traditional mineral wool.
Europe-wide, the potential market for the
COFAHE façade panel solution is 4-5 million square metres, consisting of new-build
and renovation projects for buildings below
28 metres in height.

Aeronautics

The first thermoplastic composite tailplane
developed and put into production for a helicopter
The innovation is a full thermoplastic
horizontal tailplane with a co-consolidated, single-piece multi-spar torsion
box for the AgustaWestland AW169
helicopter. This main load-carrying
member is 3 metres long and spans
tip-to-tip. It consists of four preforms
that are melted together under pressure.
Replaceable thermoplastic leading and
trailing edges are attached to the torsion
box. The leading edges are made of
consolidated thermoplastic laminates,
supported by a number of thin pressformed ribs. Thermoplastics were used
for the leading edges because of their
good impact properties. The trailing
edges are made of thin thermofolded
thermoplastic laminates supported by
press-formed ribs. All the components
are made of TenCate Cetex® carbon/

PPS fabric-based materials. The strongly curved winglets are conventional
laminated carbon/epoxy prepreg parts.
The new design results in a 15% weight
reduction for AgustaWestland vis-à-vis
previous composite tailplane designs.
The value of the innovation lies
primarily in weight and cost savings.
The weight saving results in lower fuel
consumption and NOx/CO2 emissions. The low-weight solution is made
possible by the toughness of the thermoplastic material and by the strong,
stiff multi-spar torsion box design. The
design is made affordable by applying
co-consolidation of simple preforms
to create the main structural element
of the single-piece torsion box. AgustaWestland expects the new AW169 to
be highly successful in the civil market,

Winner: Fokker Aerostructures B.V.
(The Netherlands)
Partnership Network: AgustaWestland
(Italy), Ten Cate Advanced Composites
(The Netherlands), Ticona (Germany)

and that the company will easily exceed
sales of 500 aircraft. The new concept
could also be applied to more tailplanes.
The co-consolidated multi-spar concept
is also suitable for other products such
as aircraft floor panels.

No79 March 2013 /

jec composites magazine 51
JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #79 - March 2013

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