Novel Structural Adhesives for On-Aircraft Repair

This Phase I Small Business Innovative Research Program will develop and demonstrate a novel class of high performance structural adhesives with exceptional adhesive strength, toughness, environmental durability, and processing characteristics engineered for on-aircraft repair of advanced composites. Advanced aircraft structures utilize composite materials for weight reduction, improved corrosion resistance and fatigue durability over metallic alloys, but are prone to damage during service. In order to repair damaged elements, structural adhesive bonding is employed to enable load transfer and return the damaged component to acceptable performance requirements. For component maintainability, safety, design limitations, cost, and Warfighter readiness, on-aircraft repair of damaged composite structures is the preferred or, in some cases, required, means of aircraft maintenance. Existing structural adhesives were designed for autoclave processes, not for the limited processing restrictions of on-aircraft repair. Under this Phase I SBIR effort, combining P2SI’s adhesives technology with input from our industrial partners, the P2SI Team will develop and demonstrate a novel class of hybrid adhesives that meet the performance and processing objectives of this SBIR solicitation: namely, a vacuum bag only, volatile-free, structural film adhesive with 177°C hot/wet shear strength of at least 17.2 MPa. BENEFIT: The proposed adhesives have potential for on-aircraft repair of military and commercial aircraft, as well as improved performance over existing state of the art adhesives for structural bonding applications. Legacy as well as new commercial and military systems will benefit from this technology.