Fokker Aerospace is at Farnborough under its new name for the first time, and celebrating a new contract from Goodrich, signed at the show, to supply a composite drag brace for the Lockheed Martin F-35 landing gear.
The Dutch aerospace company - known as Stork Aerospace until earlier this year - has been developing the technology for 10 years and was the first to fly an aircraft with composite landing gear, a Lockheed Martin F-16, six years ago.
The materials used comprise polymer matrix composites (PMC). Fokker's Aerostructures division says advanced composites will be a "key factor for weight reduction and efficiency improvement in the design and redesign of future and current landing gear systems".
Innovation is the main feature of Fokker's message to the industry at the show, says Aerostructures president Hans Bűthker.
The company is still confident of winning further applications for its best-known aerostructures product, the Glare glass-reinforced aluminium laminate that makes up much of the Airbus A380's fuselage and is also used on the Airbus Military A400M. "There are all kinds of opportunities for the material," says Bűthker.
It is also pushing its thermoplastics expertise. Thermoplastic composites are used on the wing leading edge of the A340 and A380, as well as the elevators and rudders on the new Gulfstream G650. The latter is the first time the material has been used in a primary structure, says Fokker.
The company has two research and development projects involving, separately, Airbus and Boeing, as well as universities, research laboratories and material suppliers to "take thermoplastics to the next level", says Bűthker.
- All the latest news, video and images from the 2010 Farnborough air show - New this year, live streaming video of each day's flying display
Source: Flight Daily News
