The Boeing Company

Donald John Sutkus, Jr

Andrew M Hopkins

Marc Rollo Matsen

Douglas Alan McCarville

Robert James Miller

Christopher John Hottes

James M Kestner

Jennifer Sue Noel

Mark E King

Courtney M Fix

Sandie H Cheung Hallman

Darren R Walker

Christopher Gary Harris

William Thomas Kline

Abraham L Shryock

Brad Alf Hoff

Robert J Miller

Jennifer S Noel

A layup mandrel including a rib structure comprising ribs defining a lofted surface; and a skin attached to and supported by the rib structure. The skin has a surface having a curvature of the lofted surface; the ribs are disposed to at least partially shape the curvature molding a part pressed against the surface during curing of the part; and the part comprises or consists essentially of a composite material.

Rapid tooling layup mandrel

A processing apparatus such as a heating and/or debulking apparatus that may be used to debulk a plurality of uncured composite layers to form an article such as an aircraft component may include a plurality of interconnected smart susceptor heater blankets. The plurality of smart susceptor heater blankets may be connected in series or in parallel, and may be controlled to uniformly heat the component during formation.

Integrated smart susceptor heater blanket debulk system for composites

Ply wrinkling during hot drape forming of a composite laminate is reduced at outside corner radii of a forming tool. First and second tensioning materials placed between a composite laminate charge and the forming tool maintain the laminate charge in tension at the radius corners as the charge is formed down over corner radii.

Method and apparatus for reducing ply wrinkling of composite laminates during forming

A composite radius filler having a varying cross-sectional shape is pre-conditioned before being pultruded through forming dies. The composite filler radius filler includes a tab ply having a varying width that is laminated onto a supporting, full width base ply.

Automated fabrication of composite fillers

Growing community of inventors

Mercer Island, WA, United States of America

Donald John Sutkus, Jr