Lighter, more intelligent and increasingly versatile laser systems light the way to accurate and efficient ply placement. When laser projection systems first replaced physical templates in aerospace composite layup in the 1990s, the result was nothing short of revolutionary. "The customer documented that lasers eliminated 80 percent of the fabrication time," says Scott Blake, president of Assembly Guidance Systems (Chelmsford, Mass., U.S.A.), of one of his earliest customers' experience with his company's laser placement equipment. Previously, the customer had layed up its 28-ft long helicopter rotor blades in the traditional time-consuming process, using three 9-ft long fiberglass templates for each composite ply. Each template had to be lifted by two people, and then the three had to be bolted together, pinned into the tool, scribed for the outline and then removed before the ply could be placed. The process had to be repeated for each successive ply.
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