Innovative Concepts for Low Cost, Light Weight, Highly Durable, Tooling for Composite Structural Component Fabrication

Renegade Materials Corporation in collaboration with Janicki Industries (JI) completed a Phase I SBIR in October, 2012 focused on optimizing the processing of Renegade"s out-of-autoclave (OOA), high-temperature bismaleimide (BMI) prepreg for use in low cost, durable tooling facesheets. Renegade and Janicki now propose to collaborate on an effort to demonstrate this facesheet concept combined with Janicki"s proprietary substructure approach on a production tool for a large aerospace composite structure on the F-35 Aircraft. F-35 components under consideration are the Weapons Bay Door and the Central Access Straps. Additional work will include simulating tooling cycles on two smaller tools fabricated as part of a Phase I Option, scaling up the Renegade OOA BMI prepreg process for production readiness and completing a cost analysis to show cost savings realized by this innovative approach. Combining Renegade"s OOA BMI prepreg with Janicki"s novel facesheet and substructure tool design will 1) remove the limitation of scale imposed by autoclave size restrictions, 2) increase the available industrial supplier pool for the manufacture of BMI composite tools, 3) reduce cost and lead times for the manufacture of composite tooling, and 4) allow for repair and/or replacement of the facesheet after extensive use in production.