Search Results

Sciaky, a Chicago-based subsidiary of Phillips Service Industries, Inc. (PSI), will contribute its novel Electron Beam Additive Manufacturing (EBAM) wire-fed metal 3D printing technology to a new traditional/additive hybrid process to manufacturing titanium alloy aircraft components.

The solutions – which have already received nationwide approval from multiple UAM operators – provide scalable and secure end-to-end infrastructure and applications to help organizations and governments manage data and capitalize on the UAM economy.

A General Atomics Aeronautical System, Inc. (GA-ASI) MQ-9B SkyGuardian remotely piloted aircraft (RPA) was controlled – from takeoff to landing – by an operator using a GA-ASI certifiable ground control station (CGCS), marking the first time a CGCS was used to control an end-to-end flight and the first step in type-certifying the unit.

The potential of daily on-demand aviation in and around cities is a major goal of many aerospace start-ups, including those that participated in the panel at SAE International’s AeroTech Americas 2019 event in Charleston, South Carolina. Companies like Zeva Aero, Detroit Flying Cars, and Varon Vehicles, are continuing to develop various vehicle types, whether they generate lift during forward flight or use a multi-rotor vertical flight approach, to make widespread personal urban air mobility (UAM) a reality in the coming years.

The Rapid Aerial Extraction System (RAES) pod is a self-contained device that can attach to an ordnance pylon on any fixed-wing aircraft and enable it to provide vertical lift recovery capability like that of a helicopter.

When a four-alarm fire started burning at a Santa Clara, California construction site down the street from Impossible Aerospace Corporation, the startup sent one of its US-1 unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) or drone equipped with thermal and optical sensors to help ground crews battle the blaze.

A cowling, or engine cover, is a critical airframe component that reduces drag and directing airflow into the engine. For the E-8C JSTARS, an aircraft with four massive Pratt and Whitney JT3D-based TF33-102C turbofan engines, each set of engine cowling components can cost up to $80,000 per set. Even a slightly warped cowling renders the entire housing unsafe and unserviceable.

Four of these technologies – smart coatings for corrosion detection and protection, aluminum alloys for high temperature applications, particle contamination mitigation technologies, and thermal and environmental barrier coating systems – are among NASA’s most in-demand technologies and have been applied to mainstream engineering projects.

In contrast to the stiff, rigid wings found on most commercial aircraft, flexible wing technology is considered essential to next generation, fuel efficient aircraft. However, flexible wings are susceptible to “flutter,” or highly destructive aeroelastic instability. To better understand and mitigate flutter, engineers at NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center (AFRC) equipped the X-56 with fiber optic sensing (FOS) technology.

Continental Aerospace Technologies is partnering with Diamond Aircraft Industries GmbH of Austria to provide a new powerplant for the DA50 general aviation aircraft. Continental also recently expanded its portfolio with a “cash and in-kind contribution” investment in Ampaire Inc., an electric aircraft and propulsion company.

“We originally thought solar cells would be standard on the airplane’s wings,” says George E. Bye, founder and CEO of Bye Aerospace Bye. “However, with eFlyer’s primary markets being flight training and air taxi services, it makes more sense to make the price of the airplane as reasonable as possible.”

Future airspace will be filled with unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) or drones, commercial aircraft, helicopters, and more. Several prototypes are currently targeting urban air mobility (UAM) platforms, such as air taxis, and revolutionary aircraft models like next-generation commercial supersonic aircraft. Add to this autonomous swarm technologies, enabling manned-unmanned teaming, and systems for future vertical lift and it’s clear that the technology wave can easily become overwhelming.

While the pandemic continues, aerospace companies are rising to embrace new and emerging challenges at a time when there’s so much innovation. This innovation can be seen in the emergence of urban air mobility (UAM), the rebirth of supersonic flight, the drive towards a “zero emission” aircraft, and the continued use of autonomous drones for delivery, freight, search & rescue, and defense. There are exciting new developments in space as companies are developing products for commercial exploration and space tourism, and new ways to launch satellites. A new generation of engineering is also emerging in the defense sector and its development of not only aircraft, but also ships, tankers, and even flight trainers.

Lockheed Martin’s VCSi software can simultaneously control multiple UAV types, operating anywhere on Earth.

Jun 13, 2018 - The Aerospace Material Specification committee on Additive Manufacturing (AMS-AM) at SAE International in Warrendale, Pennsylvania, has released its first suite of Aerospace Material Specifications (AMS) additive manufacturing materials and process specifications. The new aerospace technical standards, now available from SAE, support the certification of critical aircraft and spacecraft parts, providing both a framework to protect the integrity of material property data and traceability within the aerospace supply chain.

Standards development teams at SAE International in Warrendale, Pa., have issued 11 new technical documents and revised or reaffirmed another 54 technical reports focused on mobility engineering across the aerospace, automotive, and commercial transportation communities. The new documents, issued throughout June 2018, cover a variety of technical subject areas, including: diagnostic link connector security, mitigation strategies against illumination effects, data dictionary for quantities used in cyber physical exams, requirements for production of metal powder feedstock for use in additive manufacturing of aerospace parts, and laser powder bed fusion process.

The 3D printing materials market will experience high double-digit growth in the aerospace industry through 2024, as manufacturers of aircraft and spacecraft vehicles and components increasingly adopt and reap the benefits of additive manufacturing, market analysts at Frost & Sullivan in Mountain View, California, predict.

Engineers from the Air Force Research Laboratory’s (AFRL’s) Manufacturing Technologies Division successfully demonstrated the capabilities of a new multi-purpose maintenance and manufacturing robot at the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio.

Equispheres will use the investment to conduct the research and development needed to build reactors that will produce powders of higher-strength materials, such as steels, cobalt, chrome, and Inconel.

Even at the early stages of this new era of urban air mobility, there is already a scramble amongst well-known aerospace giants, as well as start-ups, to develop and evaluate the civil VTOL market. And this all starts with air-taxi concepts.