Method for making a bonded laminated article bend portion
AssigneeGeneral Electric Company
InventorsPeter Makarenko, Stacy E. Harris, Robert R. Martin
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Abstract
A bend portion of a bonded, laminated article is made substantially free of wrinkling, which results in interlaminar voids and discontinuities, by applying tension to at least one layer of a radially outer portion of a preform of the article during bonding, the tension being applied in a direction away from the bend, typically generally tangentially in respect to an inner portion. The apparatus includes a rigid support to carry the preform bend portion, held to the support to enable application of force or pressure to the outer layer.
Claims6
In a method for making a fiber reinforced bonded laminated article bend portion from an article preform defined by a plurality of superimposed fiber reinforced non-fully cured layers disposed about and extending beyond a bend in an article, the bend portion including a radially outer portion defined by at least one of the superimposed layers, and a radially inner portion, the radially outer portion prior to bonding extending farther from the bend than does the radially inner portion, the steps of:
- applying tension to the radially outer portion of said article perform relative to the radially inner portion in a direction away from the bend during bonding together of the superimposed layers,
- while holding the article preform on rigid support tooling.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.