Date: Apr 15, 2012 Source: MDA (
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Summary:
The pultrusion process is an automated, low-cost composite material manufacturing technique most commonly associated with fabrication of commodity items like ladder rails, window frames, roadside markers, tool handles and other moderately sized, lightly loaded, constant-cross-section structures. KaZaK has worked to evolve and expand the applicability of the pultrusion process to the point that it is now capable of making very large high-performance structures for military ships, aircraft, missiles and spacecraft, greatly reducing the cost of these items compared to similarly performing composite hardware made with other more conventional manufacturing technologies.
Technology Description:
Pultrusion pulls reinforcing fibers like glass, Kevlar, and carbon, in combination with wet resins like vinyl ester, polyester, phenolic and epoxy, through a short, heated tool to create finished constant-cross-section hardware at speeds up to 10 feet per minute. Pultrusion is the fiber-reinforced composite manufacturing process analog to metal and plastic extrusion, which squeezes weaker and/or heavier materials through similar constant-cross-section tools. To meet the demanding stiffness, strength, weight, and cost needs of its MDA customer and others, KaZaK has worked to extend and adapt the inherently low-cost manufacturing capability of the pultrusion process to a wide range of high-performance military and commercial composite structures. In addition to significant processing technology and design advancements, KaZaK has built very large-scale pultrusion machines optimized for making special types of military and commercial structures. For example, to make military tactical shelters, KaZaK designed, built, and operates the widest panel-making pultrusion equipment in the world. The company's wide-panel pultrusion equipment is capable of producing solid and sandwich-cored structures greater than 10 feet wide and of unlimited length for ships, shelters, bridges, and construction materials. Applied to the manufacture of DD(X) superstructure, KaZaK's pultrusion-optimized design with integral self-fixturing joints is projected to reduce the cost of this large composite structure by 50%.
For MDA, KaZaK has developed a special pultrusion system optimized for making carbon/epoxy missile launch canisters (up to 3 feet square in cross section), potentially replacing the current baseline manufacturing process of filament winding with a system that can be far more cost-effective. The canister-making pultrusion equipment is optimized for making very high precision, very straight pultrusions. The same technology is currently being applied to the production of submarine masts.
MDA Origins:
KaZaK received a 2003 Phase I SBIR to manufacture a canister system for the PAC-3 missile series. In its currently-active Phase II, the company will demonstrate production of low-cost PAC-3 missile launch canisters capable of replacing baseline filament wound hardware.
Spinoff Applications:
KaZaK has identified many uses for its unique adaptations to pultrusion technology: large portable shelters for troop housing that are cost-competitive with the use of tents, shipping containers for missiles and ammunition, safer energy-absorbing utility poles designed to compete with wood in replacement scenarios, and sign posts that can be bent flat by an impact, then return undamaged to their original vertical position. KaZaK has applied pultrusion technology to the production of low-cost wings and control surfaces for missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), and has pultruded flight hardware for a large number of space vehicles including Cassini (Saturn orbiter), Galileo (Jupiter orbiter), Voyager, and Pioneer (currently departing the solar system, arriving in the general vicinity of the star Aldebaran in approximately 2 million years). The company manufactured over 2,000 feet of carbon/epoxy truss structure for the Shuttle Radar Topography Mission boom (the largest object ever deployed and recovered from space -- now on display at the National Air and Space Museum).
Commercialization:
KaZaK discusses several unusual commercial developments on its Website, including large seismic braces for limiting earthquake damage to buildings, bridge and pier decking (up to 10-feet wide with tongue-and-groove edging), and high-temperature pultruded carbon spacecraft heat pipes. KaZaK has one of DoD's highest SBIR Commercialization Index scores, a measure of the company's success in converting SBIR funding to follow-on product sales. The company is actively seeking partnering and licensing opportunities to expand its market.
Company Profile:
KaZaK serves the aerospace, military, and commercial sectors by integrating engineering design strategies with low-cost manufacturing techniques to produce composite hardware in a large variety of shapes and sizes. It is a growing company with locations in Woburn, MA and Yemassee, SC.
