Learn to Repair Advanced Composite Structures, 1-2-3!
August 30th, 2022 by Lou Dorworth
At Abaris, we pride ourselves as the leaders in advanced composite repair training. We have been doing this type of training since our inception in 1983 and have taught tens of thousands of students within that timeframe. We offer 3-different courses that build on one another to provide you with the best set of repair skills available.
M-1/R-1, Advanced Composite Structures: Fabrication and Damage Repair – Phase 1:
Our most popular course is designed to meet the needs of a wide range of personnel, from the novice to the seasoned professional. The “Phase 1” course covers the fundamentals of advanced composite materials, processes, layup/lamination, vacuum bagging, adhesive bonding, tooling, repair, and inspection methods and techniques, and much more.
*This course is a prerequisite for both our repair and manufacturing programs and is highly recommended to anyone seeking a better understanding of advanced composite repairs.
R-2, Advanced Composite Structures: Damage Repair – Phase 2:
This course is designed as a direct follow-on to our M-1/R-1 course for repair designers, technicians, mechanics, supervisors, and quality assurance personnel directly involved in providing high performance repairs to advanced composite structures. It is a prerequisite for R-3.
This class is devoted to hands-on repair skills. Less time is spent in the classroom and more time is spent in the workshop, allowing the student time to practice different repair scenarios. Students will be introduced to typical repair instructions and given a variety of damaged parts and structures to perform repairs to throughout the week. Practice includes evaluating the material type and ply orientation of an unknown structure and removing internal contamination (such as water ingress) are fundamental parts of this course. In addition, each student-team will be assessing damage to real composite structures, determining a repair approach, and undertaking the repairs. Over the five-day period, three different parts will be repaired by each team of participants, with different materials and challenges with each new repair scenario.
Our facility has many different types of “hot-bonders” to work with. The advantages of each will become familiar to the students as they can work with several of them individually throughout the week. Much emphasis is made on proper thermocouple and heat blanket placement and many different bag schedules are explored to facilitate the repairs.
R-3, Advanced Composite Structures: Damage Repair – Phase 3:
This class presents more challenging damage assessment and repair challenges than those presented in our Phase 2 course. The course is mostly hands-on, in the workshop, addressing large and more complex repair scenarios that require multi-step repair processes. Instruction will include discussions on various methods for recreating damaged-part surfaces, as well as actual fabrication of composite repair tools used to restore a complex-contoured shape, thus restoring the critical aerodynamic surface of the part. Other alternative approaches to tooling will be discussed and/or employed during the class to broaden the technician’s overall possibilities.
Student-teams will be subjected to realistic composite components that have sustained damage to large areas or complex features that will entail extensive evaluation and repair. The students will be tasked with creating an appropriate repair plan using standard repair procedures and creative processing schemes. In addition, students will learn more about processing their repairs utilizing “hot-bonders” with heat blankets, heat lamps, infrared heaters, and hot-air machines. The students will learn the capabilities as well as the limitations of the different process equipment available to them within the industry. On-going experimentation with thermocouple placement and different heat-source equipment will be encouraged so that a working knowledge of these systems can be attained.
Repairs to composite edge-bands with fasteners/hole locations will also be addressed in this class. Methods for removal and replacement of fasteners and/or potted details in composite structures are discussed, including the use of appropriate tools and techniques.
Because of the complexity of the repairs and the advanced skills that are required, this course is only being offered to students that have graduated from our R-2 repair course.
Please check the schedule for the next round of classes that will work best for you. Contact us at training@abaris.com to find out what special discount we can offer if you take all three courses within a year.
Link to 2022 schedule.
Link to 2023 schedule.