Alenia Aeronautica has delivered two laser-welded Airbus A380 centre fuselage panels to Airbus's Nordenham-Hamburg factory for fatigue testing. The test will evaluate laser welded and conventionally assembled panels as part of the European Union-funded Technology Applications to Near-term Business Goals and Objectives (TANGO) programme.
Laser welding reduces the weight of the assembled part by eliminating the need for the joining flanges between stringers and skin panels required in normal rivetting techniques. It also eliminates fasteners, the main source of corrosion and fatigue cracks in skin panels.
Manufacturing time is reduced as the laser welding linear speed is faster than that of an automated riveting tool - nearly 10m/min (33ft/min) against 1m/min.
Alenia uses a neodymium-yttrium aluminium garnet (Nd-YAG) type laser to join the skin and stringers that make up the panels.
Laser beam welding is already used by Airbus in Saint-Nazaire for A318 rear fuselage lower skin panel production. Alenia says it is leading this technology in Europe and aims to improve process productivity, with daily production of up to four panels with 15 welded stringers each. Alenia hopes to use its experience on Boeing's Sonic Cruiser programme, in which it is a partner.
TANGO plans to apply new technologies to civil aircraft production to reduce costs. The €85 million ($83 million) project is organised by Airbus. It will culminate in 2004 with the development of test structures, including a composite wingbox and metal to composite joint; a composite joint; a composite centre wingbox; a composite fuselage section; and an advanced metallic fuselage section.
Source: Flight International
