Opticoms
Optimised Composite Structures
for Small Aircraft
Opticoms EU PROJECT [699740]
July 2016 - Mar 2024
OPTICOMS PROJECT
Clean Sky’s seven-year OPTICOMS (Optimised Composite Structures for Small Aircraft) project, which kicked off in July 2016. Funded by the European Commission under Horizon 2020, it aims to bring innovative approaches in automated composite aircraft structure R&D to the Small Air Transport (SAT) category of aviation, enabling smaller airframe companies to justify building up automation infrastructure and realise a return on investment on low volume production.
The project was challenged with ambitious cost and weight savings goals, with most of them realized successfully during the course of the project.
In addition to the automated manufacturing, progress in many other critical technologies helped reach these substantial goals. Innovative design, one shot integral structure infusion, large structural bonding, structural health monitoring of bond-line quality, out-of-autoclave curing, virtual testing, innovative tooling and “spring-in” deformation simulation, are some of the technologies which ensured a successful OPTICOMS project.
