Bachelor Assignment

In recent years, the TCRC has developed thermoplastic composite over-moulding and the welding of composite panels. Combining these two technologies presents new challenges of how to join over-moulded composite panels to create closed shelled structures. Within this Bachelor Thesis, these technologies were explored and a new design approach to systematically produce the closed component was created. This new approach was applied to redesign an aircraft winglet. The final redesign resulted in an overall weight reduction of 23%, along with new manufacturing approaches and design considerations that can be applied to the development and redesign of closed overmoulded components in the future to produce sustainable, lightweight, and stiff components, suited for the aviation industry.