ITT [ITT] today is announcing an approximately $120 million investment in a new facility for their defense and commercial composites business at the Paris Air Show, a company official said.
Jim Barber, vice president and general manager of ITT Electronic Systems’ Integrated Structures, said the investment will expand company capabilities in producing carbon fiber, and new automated material placement machines will make production more reliable and quicker.
“We’ve begun the process, acquiring machines, laying the ground work for the future facility and will be operational in the first quarter of next year,” Barber said in an interview.
Since there can be different chemical combinations for composites and resins depending on the application, part of the company investment is to be qualified for those manufacturing processes.
The new building located in the Salt Lake City area will be in addition to ITT’s current composites footprint of 130,000 square feet.
“The market for composites aerostructures is growing significantly,” Barber said. “At the end of 2010 it was about a $9.5 billion market growing out by 2020 to be about a $22 billion market. There is a real need to fill that market with automation.”
The forecast is that about 70 percent of that market needs to be done through automation, he said. “Our investment in these machines and the infrastructure to support that will indeed allow us to capture some portion of that market and enable growth.”
Producing composites is labor intensive, predominantly done by hand layup now, he said. Machines are 10-12 times faster, offering “significantly better quality, reduce labor costs and have a quicker, faster throughput.”
ITT, which has been in the composites business for some 40 years, also spends internal research and development funds to improve composites manufacturing, he said. One area is in examining ways to reduce or eliminate current metallic fasteners, which would reduce cost and weight. Another area would be to embed sensors within the composites, often called “smart structures.”
“We are spending our money wisely and looking at ways to advancing the utilization” of composites, Barber said.
The fact the investment is under way in machines, infrastructure, and a new facility is what potential customers want to hear–not that the company is thinking about investing. And ITT also has the resume: it partners with Lockheed Martin [LMT] providing composites for the F-35 aircraft, and provides Sikorsky [UTX] as a Tier 1 supplier with fully assembled sponsons and tail rotor pylons for the CH-53K helicopter.
“We can go all the way through from design and development of composites all the way through assembly of final product,” Barber said.
Composites are a boon to the aerospace industry as a proven alternative to metal structural parts for helicopters, commercial and military aircraft and unmanned aerial vehicles, offering a tremendous weight reduction–20 percent or more–which means better fuel efficiency, as just one example, he said.
Additionally there are studies within the Army looking for ways to develop composite armor for ground vehicles. There are some applications now and a lot of companies are interested in it.
Utilizing composite technology in defense structures creates a lighter, greener aircraft that is more resistant to corrosion and in-flight stress than metal structures and safer for the war fighter.
The Sikorsky CH-53K helicopter will be the first all-composite rotary wing aircraft, Barber said. “They’re actually going to see four times the lift capability; you’re going to see near 25 percent reduction in operations and support. Composites also give increased survivability from battle damage; they’re predicting a 20 percent reduction in fuel consumption.”
When you put all that together you get a better aircraft with improved range and capability, he said. The K model is lighter but stronger.