In recent years, aerospace Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) have shown a desire to incorporate Out-of-Autoclave (OoA) composite materials into the design of their aircraft structural components. Currently, a large portion of OoA processing techniques rely on convection ovens for heating. Ovens generally feature relatively low convective heat transfer coefficients, which induce thermal lag, limit ramp rates, and thereby hinder production. This study examines the use of an integrally heated tool-plate consisting of a fiat aluminum plate and a novel TCX (TM) resistive element for OoA processing The TCX (TM) heated tool is compared to a standard lab scale convection oven in terms of laminate quality and energy consumption. For a standard cure cycle, the oven and heated tool are found to produce equivalent quality laminates. When an aggressive ramp rate is imposed using the heated tool, laminate quality decreased, although high process variability may be the root cause of these results. In terms of energy consumption, two distinct comparisons indicate energy savings of 66 % and 92 % for a standard cure at the lab scale when using the TCX (TM) heated tool. High ramp rate cures are found to require more available power, but result in similar total energy use.
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