The Boeing Company

Chilip Chan

Joseph L Sweetin

Lisa Christina Carlson

Garrett C Hanson

Clifford D Borowicz

Ian E Schroeder

Eric Sean Kamila

Jake Adam Reeves

Kanna M Pham

Josephine LaCoe

Roozbeh Chavoshian

Joseph Lee Sweetin, Iii

Kiet Nguyen

Joseph Sweetin

Lisa Carlson

Composite assemblies are described that include composite spars that are co-cured with one or more sacrificial members on their flanges, forming an integrated sacrificial surface for the composite spars. In one embodiment, the composite assembly includes a composite spar having a web and flanges that project from sides of the web. The composite assembly further includes a sacrificial member of composite materials co-cured with the composite spar on an outer surface of at least one of the flanges. In addition, the sacrificial member has an outer surface that has been machined into conformance with an inner surface of at least one skin panel for an aircraft structure to form a contact surface with the at least one skin panel.

Composite spars with integrated sacrificial surfaces

An example method for forming a flat composite charge into a composite blade stiffener includes cutting a flat composite charge along a cut line into a first piece and a second piece having an angle, positioning the first piece and the second piece of the flat composite charge on a forming mandrel about a tooling plunger, activating the tooling plunger to drive the first piece and the second piece into a cavity of the forming mandrel resulting in the first piece and the second piece folding at the cut line, withdrawing the tooling plunger from the cavity of the forming mandrel, compressing the forming mandrel to apply a lateral pressure to the first piece and the second piece folded into the cavity, and applying a vertical pressure to a first flange and a second flange of the first piece and the second piece, respectively, to form the composite blade stiffener.

Methods for forming a composite blade stiffener and facilitating application of barely visible impact damage treatments

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Seattle, WA, United States of America

Chilip Chan