Fail Safe Composite Aircraft Arrestment

Navy pilots have landed for years by capturing a heavy steel cable designed to stop them safely on carrier decks. Multiple cable sets strung across the flight deck are responsible for transferring enormous aircraft deceleration loads to below-deck hydraulic arresting engines. Current steel cables are very heavy, and must be changed after a relatively low number of landings. As the highly lubricated cables are continuously tested with 100,000 pounds tensile loading, outer steel wires fail visually, indicating need for replacing the entire cable. Realizing the simplicity and ease of this readily observable failure, KaZaK will develop a new composite/metal hybrid that features both the current visual damage indication and a failsafe construction. This new KaZaKable will have half the weight of the present design, with many times greater operational lifespan. KaZaK proposes to develop and demonstrate an automated pultrusion/braiding technology to manufacture the new cables at very low cost. Scale model cables will be built and tested in Phase I. The fail safe cable system development will be completed in Phase II with a variation of a current KaZaK cable fitting design. Extensive commercialization experience will catalyze KaZaK’s success for the next generation cable insertion into the fleet.