APPARATUS AND METHOD FOR CLOSE TOLERANCE FORMING OF AREAS IN FIBRE REINFORCED RESIN COMPOSITE COMPONENTS

摘要

An apparatus and method for forming a fibre reinforced resin composite component by a resin transfer infusion (RTI) process in which a preform (13) is laid up on a hard base tool (11) and a bagging blanket (14) is applied as flexible upper tooling. Edge and/or other regions of the preform (13) are superimposed by localised control plates (19) which, together with spacer pins (20) passing through the preform (13) serve to determine localised dimensional accuracy in the component without the need for hard upper tooling throughout.