Abstract: A method for making a corrugated fiber reinforced preform for a corrugated channel is disclosed which involves the sequential application of fiber plies to a shaping tool, each of the plies individually formed to the contours of the shaping tool, using a corrugating tools, restraining means used to maintain the plies in conformance with the tool. The plies are then subjected to debulking and heated to stabilize the fiber plies in their shaped condition, with additional plies applied thereover using the same steps of application, forming, restraining and stabilizing to produce a thick debulked fiber preform which avoids wrinkling of the fibers at the radius between the web and side portions of the corrugated channel.
Type:
Grant
Filed:
June 25, 1996
Date of Patent:
March 16, 1999
Assignees:
Dow-United Technologies Composite Products, Boeing Defense and Space Group
Inventors:
Peter Gregory Donecker, Lawrence Nicholas Varholak, Jr., Mark John Schmitz, Harold Marion Goodridge, Jeffrey A. Lauder, Kirk Douglas Skaggs