FORT WORTH, Texas—Lockheed Martin [LMT] in December will begin operating at its F-35 production plant here a Cincinnati AutoDrill that performs overlap machining to install the left-hand and right-hand side wing box to the aircraft’s wing center barrel.
Lockheed Martin F-35 Business Development Manager Kevin McCormick told Defense Daily Friday via a spokesman that the Cincinnati AutoDrill is drilling the upper wing skin holes common to the center wing after attachment of the wing boxes to the center wing. It is drilling approximately 10-12 shipsets per month. McCormick in October called the Cincinnati AutoDrill the production facility’s newest piece of equipment during a tour.
Lockheed Martin, McCormick said, previously drilled the upper wing skin to center wing overlap holes on a 13-year-old MAG system located at the northwest corner of the plant. He said the company planned for years to either move this autodrill to the wing systems area or buy a new autodrill.
Lockheed Martin decided to purchase the new autodrill to take advantage of the newest technologies, McCormick said. The new Cincinnati AutoDrill, he said, reduces waste because it is a minimum-quantity lubricant system, compared to the old autodrill which was a flood-coolant system that flooded the part with fluid. McCormick said, in addition, the new Cincinnati AutoDrill will measure the holes automatically, reducing span and cost for verification.
McCormick said Lockheed Martin, in 2017, will install an additional Cincinnati AutoDrill to drill some of the holes for mate of the wing boxes to the center wing. The wingbox, McCormick said, is the internal or skeletal structure of the aircraft’s wing–the spars and ribs that form and hold the shape of the wing. Lockheed Martin declined to say how much it paid for the Cincinnati AutoDrill.
McCormick said the center wing, also called the wing center barrel, is the central structure of the F-35’s wing system. Its “barrel” name, McCormick said, reflects the shape of its design as it provides the structure that surrounds the aircraft’s F135 engine, which is developed by Pratt & Whitney of United Technologies Corp. [UTX]
The center wing, McCormick said, also contains the wing carry-through bulkheads to which the left-hand and right-hand wing boxes are attached to, as well as the landing gear attach points, half of the internal weapons bays and a significant amount of internal fuel capacity. The center wing, McCormick said, is that portion of the F-35’s wing system that is installed between the center fuselage and the aft fuselage of the aircraft.
The Cincinnati AutoDrill was developed by Cincinnati before it was acquired by the French company Fives, which designs and supplies machine tool and complete manufacturing solutions in a broad range of industrial sectors. With a rigid chassis based on a boring mill and an extend-reach ram, the Cincinnati AutoDrill is designed for ultra-precise milling and drilling on massive composite and sandwich structures.