Novel Additive Manufacturing Approach to UAS Components

The development of military air vehicles, whether they are manned or unmanned, is a multi-decade endeavor.  As competitive militaries are bulking up and quickly developing novel technologies, it has become increasingly critical for the U.S. defense innovation time cycles to be reduced.  There are many pieces to this problem, but two lines of attack include an increased use of novel manufacturing technologies and a streamlined certification process.  This project addresses both of these.  The PICARD program at AFRL is tasked with the manufacture of a UAV using low-cost attritable aircraft technologies (LCAAT), such as additive manufacturing (AM).  One of the primary issues with air vehicle certification, is that air vehicles are large and require significant time and expense to manufacture at full scale.  This could potentially be addressed by understanding how materials properties change as a given material is scaled from larger to smaller.  By understanding this, one could produce smaller version of parts for certification, reducing both cost and time.