Vol. 58 No. 1 (2021)   New Products & Technologies
Technical Papers

Low-cost and High-quality Drape Forming Technology for Complex Shape Composite Parts

YUSEI KONDO
KAZUKI NOMA
HIROMICHI AKIYAMA
MASAYUKI KANEMASU

One of the forming methods for complex-shape composite parts such as spars and stringers of aircraft wings is to form multi-layer prepreg at once (drape forming), which is promising as a low-cost forming method with a short flow time. However, this method has the problem that if the deformation behavior of the prepreg is improper during forming into a part shape, manufacturing defects such as fiber wrinkling occurs in shape change areas of the part, causing a decrease in the strength of the composite part. Therefore, we have developed a low-cost, high-quality drape forming technology using forming simulation that can predict the deformation behavior of prepreg.