The completion of the SSAM facility makes the Al Ain manufacturer now the Middle East and North Africa (MENA)’s first supplier of aerospace-grade pre-impregnated carbon fibres and the fourth globally. The completion of the facility also marks a new chapter in Abu Dhabi’s drive towards a sustainable homegrown manufacturing sector.

The 8,500 square meter SSAM facility is currently being equipped with the latest technology and machinery prior to the testing and qualifying of processes designed to supply carbon fibre prepreg materials for primary structure applications in Boeing’s 777X programme.

The constant enhancement and expansion of Abu Dhabi’s aerospace manufacturing capabilities reflect our commitment towards product and service excellence for our partners, customers and the global market. We look forward to strengthening our global partnerships as we aim to further grow Abu Dhabi’s participation within the global aerospace supply chain.

Badr Al-Olama, Chairman of Strata and Head of Aerospace at Mubadala

The company say that key positions have already been filled and that Khalid Al Nuaimi, a Strata engineer, will head the Strata Solvay project and manage communications between the two companies, as well as execute the business plan, budget and purchasing of equipment for the facility.

Strata work with leading aircraft manufacturers, including Airbus, Boeing, Leonardo, and Pilatus. Based at Nibras Al Ain Aerospace Park, Strata supports the development of a leading aerospace hub in Abu Dhabi as part of the emirate’s economic diversification initiatives.

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The 737 Max was grounded back in March 2018 after two fatal crashes that killed a total of 346 people. Boeing continued to produce the aircraft but in December of 2019 announced plans to suspend production.

The company has said that during the suspension, mechanics and engineers have worked together to standardise work packages and revamp the kitting process to ensure employees have everything they need to build the aeroplane.

We’ve been on a continuous journey to evolve our production system and make it even stronger. These initiatives are the next step in creating the optimal build environment for the 737 MAX.

Walt Odisho, vice president and general manager of the 737 program

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Boeing doesn’t expect the 737 Max to fly again until at least the middle of 2020 although it has yet to be cleared to return by the FAA. Boeing recently announced plans to lay off almost 7,000 staff as Coronavirus continues to hit the aerospace industry hard.

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The company will use the time to further deep clean and sanitise workspaces and facilities as they continue to take precautions to protect the health and safety of its workforce against the COVID-19 pandemic.

When production does resume on the Boeing programs, the company will align the costs and workforce to the new level of production set by Boeing. This could potentially include additional workforce actions.

Operations in support of Spirit AeroSystems defence customers, Airbus, aftermarket and MRO, third party fabrication work, other non-Boeing work, and other growth programs will continue.

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Boeing plans to begin reducing production activity today and projects the suspension of such operations to begin on Wednesday, March 25, at sites across the Puget Sound area. The suspension of production operations will last 14 days, during which Boeing will continue to monitor government guidance and actions on COVID-19 and its associated impacts on all company operations. During this time, we will be conducting additional deep cleaning activities at impacted sites and establishing rigorous criteria for return to work.

This necessary step protects our employees and the communities where they work and live. We continue to work closely with public health officials, and we’re in contact with our customers, suppliers and other stakeholders who are affected by this temporary suspension. We regret the difficulty this will cause them, as well as our employees, but it’s vital to maintain health and safety for all those who support our products and services, and to assist in the national effort to combat the spread of COVID-19.

Boeing President and CEO Dave Calhoun

Production employees should continue to report for their assigned shifts today and will receive guidance on their role in the suspension shutdown process.

Puget Sound area-based employees who can work from home will continue to do so. Those who cannot work remotely will receive paid leave for the initial 10 working days of the suspension – double the company policy – which will provide coverage for the 14 calendar day suspension period.

Boeing is working to minimise this suspension’s impact on the company’s ability to deliver and support its defence and space programs and ensure the readiness of our defence customers to perform their vital missions. Boeing will work closely with those customers in the coming days to develop plans that ensure customers are supported throughout this period. Critical distribution operations in support of airline, government, and maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) customers will continue.

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The 777X took off at Paine Field in Everett, Washington for a three hour, 51-minute flight over Washington state before landing at Seattle’s Boeing Field, two earlier attempts were called off due to high winds.

The first of four dedicated 777-9 flight test aeroplanes, WH001 will now undergo checks before resuming testing in the coming days. The test fleet, which began ground testing in Everett last year, will endure a comprehensive series of tests and conditions on the ground and in the air over the coming months to demonstrate the safety and reliability of the design.

The Federal Aviation Administration has said that rigorous testing will be conducted before the plane is allowed to carry passengers, while Sir Tim Clarke President of Emirates, has said the plane should be put through “hell on Earth” to ensure it is safe and performs properly.

We took the time to get the aeroplane ready for flight test so I think we are going to march through flight tests successfully and quickly and get it certified to the FAA standards.

Boeing’s chief test pilot Craig Bomben

The 252-foot-long passenger plane will deliver 10 per cent lower fuel use and emissions and 10 per cent lower operating costs than the competition thanks to advanced aerodynamics, the latest generation carbon-fibre composite wing and the most advanced commercial engine ever built, GE Aviation’s GE9X.

In December 2014, Boeing began construction on the composites facility in St. Louis to build 777X parts with six autoclaves for the wing and empennage parts, starting in 2017. The 787 ‘surge’ line at the Everett factory would be converted into a 777X early production line by the end of 2015. Boeing then created a new building next door to the Everett factory, with a 120 ft (37 m) autoclave, and a robot to wind fibre for the wings.

The company says it has sold 340 of the plane, worth more than $442 million each and will go into service next year with a number of carriers including British Airways and Emirates.

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The two companies have signed a non-exclusive memorandum of understanding to explore the premium urban air market and the extension of urban traffic into airspace. As part of the partnership, the companies will create an international team to address various aspects of urban air mobility, including analysis of the market potential for premium vehicles and possible use cases.

Boeing, Porsche and Boeing’s subsidiary Aurora Flight Sciences are also developing a concept for a fully electric vertical takeoff and landing vehicle. Engineers from both companies, as well as Porsche subsidiaries Porsche Engineering Services GmbH and Studio F.A. Porsche, will implement and test a prototype.

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A 2018 study by Porsche Consulting forecasts that the urban air mobility market will pick up speed after 2025. The study also indicates that urban air mobility solutions will transport passengers more quickly and efficiently than current conventional means of terrestrial transport, at a lower cost and with greater flexibility.

The urban air taxi service seems to be picking up interest with a number of companies including Airbus all looking to get into this new market.

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ORNL printed the lower cost trim tool in only 30 hours using carbon fibre and ABS thermoplastic composite materials, which will be tested in building the Boeing 777X passenger jet. At 17.5 feet long, 5.5 feet wide and 1.5 feet tall, the 3D printed structure is comparable in length to a large sport utility vehicle and weighs approximately 1,650 pounds.

Leo Christodoulou, Boeing’s director of structures and materials said;

The existing, more expensive metallic tooling option we currently use comes from a supplier and typically takes three months to manufacture using conventional techniques. Additively manufactured tools, such as the 777X wing trim tool, will save energy, time, labour and production cost and are part of our overall strategy to apply 3D printing technology in key production areas.

During an awards ceremony held at DOE’s Manufacturing Demonstration Facility at ORNL, where the component was 3D printed on the lab’s Big Area Additive Manufacturing machine, Guinness World Records judge Michael Empric measured the trim tool, proved it exceeded the required minimum of 0.3 cubic metres, or approximately 10.6 cubic feet, and announced the new record title.

Vlastimil Kunc, leader of ORNL’s polymer materials development team said;

The recognition by Guinness World Records draws attention to the advances we’re making in large-scale additive manufacturing composites research. Using 3D printing, we could design the tool with less material and without compromising its function.

After ORNL completes the verification testing, Boeing plans to use the manufactured trim-and-drill tool in the company’s new production facility in St. Louis and provide information back to ORNL on the tool’s performance. The tool will be used to secure the jet’s composite wing skin for drilling and machining before assembly.

View the time-lapse of the piece being made here

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The new production line is set to double the production capacity of key raw materials that are used to make carbon fibre reinforced composite products. The new line has won qualification by Boeing to manufacture secondary structures such as wing movable flaps and engine nacelles, as well as interior applications.

The expansion covers the facilities and equipment to convert acrylonitrile monomers into standard modulus carbon fibres. This type of fibre is used to manufacture composite materials which have been pre-impregnated for use in applications on commercial and military planes.

Solvay’s CEO Jean-Pierre Clamadieu said;

Through this strategic capacity expansion we offer our customers greater supply capabilities and contribute to their increased needs for reinforced composite materials to reduce weight and fuel consumption and to reduce assembly costs by integrated part design. For Solvay this production expansion results in greater flexibility to strengthen our growth innovative composite materials and our leading position in the industry.

Carbon fibre composite materials’ durability, strength and fatigue life allow them to increasingly and securely replace metals on aircraft, reducing their weight, noise and CO2 emissions. In addition, composites enable the moulding of multiple sub-components into one assembly part, lowering the number of parts required as well as the assembly costs.

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But composite materials are also surprisingly vulnerable: While aluminium can withstand relatively large impacts before cracking, the many layers in composites can break apart due to relatively small impacts — a drawback that is considered the material’s Achilles’ heel.

MIT aerospace engineers have found a way to bond composite layers in such a way that the resulting material is substantially stronger and more resistant to damage than other advanced composites.

The researchers fastened the layers of composite materials together using carbon nanotubes — atom-thin rolls of carbon that, despite their microscopic stature, are incredibly strong. They embedded tiny “forests” of carbon nanotubes within a glue-like polymer matrix, then pressed the matrix between layers of carbon fibre composites. The nanotubes, resembling tiny, vertically aligned stitches, worked themselves within the crevices of each composite layer, serving as a scaffold to hold the layers together.

In experiments to test the material’s strength, the team found that, compared with existing composite materials, the stitched composites were 30% stronger, withstanding greater forces before breaking apart.

Roberto Guzman, who led the work as an MIT postdoc in the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AeroAstro), says the improvement may lead to stronger, lighter airplane parts — particularly those that require nails or bolts, which can crack conventional composites.

More work needs to be done, but we are really positive that this will lead to stronger, lighter planes. That means a lot of fuel saved, which is great for the environment and for our pockets.

Today’s composite materials are composed of layers, or plies, of horizontal carbon fibres, held together by a polymer glue, which Wardle describes as “a very, very weak, problematic area.” Attempts to strengthen this glue region include Z-pinning and 3-D weaving — methods that involve pinning or weaving bundles of carbon fibres through composite layers, similar to pushing nails through plywood, or thread through fabric.

A stitch or nail is thousands of times bigger than carbon fibres. So when you drive them through the composite, you break thousands of carbon fibres and damage the composite.

Carbon nanotubes, by contrast, are about 10 nanometers in diameter — nearly a million times smaller than the carbon fibres. Researchers we’re able to put these nanotubes in without disturbing the larger carbon fibres, and that’s what maintains the composite’s strength.

Guzman and Wardle came up with a technique to integrate a scaffold of carbon nanotubes within the polymer glue. They first grew a forest of vertically aligned carbon nanotubes, following a procedure that Wardle’s group previously developed. They then transferred the forest onto a sticky, uncured composite layer and repeated the process to generate a stack of 16 composite plies — a typical composite laminate makeup — with carbon nanotubes glued between each layer.

To test the material’s strength, the team performed a tension-bearing test — a standard test used to size aerospace parts — where the researchers put a bolt through a hole in the composite, then ripped it out. While existing composites typically break under such tension, the team found the stitched composites were stronger, able to withstand 30 percent more force before cracking.

The researchers also performed an open-hole compression test, applying force to squeeze the bolt hole shut. In that case, the stitched composite withstood 14 percent more force before breaking, compared to existing composites.

The strength enhancements suggest this material will be more resistant to any type of damaging events or features. And since the majority of the newest planes are more than 50% composite by weight, improving these state-of-the art composites has very positive implications for aircraft structural performance.

This work was supported by Airbus Group, Boeing, Embraer, Lockheed Martin, Saab AB, Spirit AeroSystems Inc., Textron Systems, ANSYS, Hexcel, and TohoTenax through MIT’s Nano-Engineered Composite aerospace STructures (NECST) Consortium and, in part, by the U.S. Army.

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First introduced in the 1970s, prepreg composites are a combination of high-strength carbon fibre and toughened epoxy resin. The 777X was the first commercial airplane to contain structurally significant composite parts. Composites account for 50% of structural weight of the 787 Dreamliner, and the 777X will have the world’s largest composite wing. Production of the 777X will begin in 2017, with its first delivery in 2020.

Boeing is the first customer for the Mubadala-Solvay joint venture, which will produce primary structure composite material for use in manufacturing the 777X empennage and floor beams. Mubadala and Solvay are planning for the joint venture to be operational by 2021 in a new facility built in Al Ain, U.A.E.

Since 2009, Boeing and Mubadala have signed several agreements to advance their collaboration in mutually beneficial ways, including in aerospace composites manufacturing. In 2013, Boeing and Mubadala announced a new Framework Strategic Agreement to increase the long-term role of Mubadala as a direct supplier to Boeing, including support as Mubadala developed prepreg manufacturing in the U.A.E.

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