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The various pieces of the previous wing were cut using a waterjet system and making each piece took several minutes, explains Jenett. The new system uses injection molding with polyethylene resin in a complex 3D mold, and produces each piece – essentially a hollow cube made up of match-size rolls along each edge – in just 17 seconds, he says, which brings it much closer to evolving production levels.
"We now have a manufacturing method," he says. Although there is an initial investment in tooling, once this is done, "the parts are cheap," he says. "We have boxes and boxes, all the same."
The resulting network, he says, has a density of 5.6 kilograms per cubic meter. For comparison, rubber has a density of about 1,500 kilograms per cubic meter. "They have the same rigidity, but ours has less than a thousandth of a density," Jenett explains.
Since the general configuration of the wing or any other structure consists of tiny subunits, no matter the shape. "You can create the geometry of your choice," he says. "The fact that most planes have the same shape" – essentially a tube with wings – "is due to the expense.This is not always the most effective form." However, massive investments in design, tooling, and production processes make it easier to maintain long-established configurations.
Studies have shown that an integrated structure of the body and wings could be much more effective for many applications, he says. Thanks to this system, these could easily be built, tested, modified and tested again.
"The research looks promising to reduce costs and increase the performance of large, lightweight, rigid structures," said Daniel Campbell, structural researcher at Aurora Flight Sciences, a Boeing company, who did not participate in this research. "The most promising applications in the short term are the structural applications of airships and space structures, such as antennas."
The new wing was designed to be as large as possible in NASA's high-speed wind tunnel at the Langley Research Center, where it performed even better than expected, says Jenett.
The same system could also be used to fabricate other structures, says Jenett, including wing-shaped blades of wind turbines, where the ability to assemble on-site could avoid the problems of transporting blades longer and longer. Similar assemblies are being developed to construct spatial structures and could potentially be useful for bridges and other high performance structures.
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