Process for making a low density syntactic foam product and the resultant product
AssigneeThe Boeing Company
InventorRobert S. Mudge
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A process for mixing a magma that can be used to make a structural syntactic foam of very low density includes the steps of mixing and agitating the dry ingredients of the foam, principally silica microspheres, in a slant cone mixer to break up any lumps and achieve a uniform fluffy mixture, and spraying a resin/solvent solution as a fog of fine droplets into the mixture. The resulting magma is folded and agitated within the mixer until the resin uniformly coats the microspheres, and the resin is packed into a mold. The filled mold is pressurized and heated in an autoclave until the resin is cured, and then the mold is cooled and opened and the finished syntactic foam part is removed.
Claims17
A process for mixing a magma for producing a low density syntactic foam, comprising:
- mixing microspheres in a rotating tumbler mixer until a uniform mixture is achieved;
- spraying a resin/solvent solution into said mixture while tumbling said mixture by rotating said mixer and while agitating said mixture with a rotating paddle agitator until said mixture is uniformly coated with a thin coating of resin, said resin/solvent solution having less than a 1.0 ml per 4 grams of resin.
A process of making a low density syntactic foam part comprising:
- mixing microspheres in a rotating mixer until a uniform mixture is achieved;
- spraying a resin/solvent solution into said mixture while tumbling said mixture by rotating said mixer and while agitating said mixture with a rotating paddle agitator until said microspheres are uniformly coated with a thin coating of resin to form a homogeneous magma, said resin solvent solution having less than 1.0 ml per 4 grams of resin;
- packing said magma into a mold;
- pressurizing said magma in said mold to express excess air voids and force said microspheres into close juxtaposition;
- allowing said resin to cure while maintaining said pressure;
- and
- opening said mold and removing said part.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.