MIKE MARTIN
Huck Aerospace chief Rene Belin does not subscribe to the "small is beautiful" theory when it comes to aircraft. For Belin, the bigger the better, and nothing comes bigger than the Airbus A380.
The maker of the Huck Lockbolt fastener, a mainstay of aircraft production for 50 years, is at Paris with a new and improved fastener, and Belin has his eyes firmly fixed on the A380.
"An A320 takes 35,000 Lockbolt fasteners, the A340 six times more, and the A380 will need five times as many as that. Each aircraft will require more than a million Lockbolts – that's a huge opportunity for us," says Belin.Huck is starting production of the next-generation Lockbolt fastener, which offers high "grip range" and thus reduced weight. New alloys such as Ti-3AL-2.5V titanium have been used in the Lockbolt. Huck says that using such fasteners on the A380 would yield a total weight saving of around three tonnes. Huck is an Alcoa business unit, and its parent is also at Paris, determined to shift its image from that of the world¹s biggest aluminium producer to a leading aerospace company.
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Says Alcoa Aerospace head Pat Hassey: "Few people know us in aerospace, but we have become a major player and we want to talk about it."
Its presence at Paris is its biggest ever at an air show, and Alcoa is specifically targeting business on the Airbus A380. It is offering a number of new aluminium alloys for the super-large aircraft. Already producer of the longest aerospace wing skins in the world, the company is increasing its length capability further to supply skins for the A380.
Development of the capability involves expansion at Alcoa's Davenport, Iowa, plant. It includes developing the ability to cast, roll and machine the largest wing skins ever produced from the company¹s new aluminium alloys.
Hassey says that much of the aerospace allocation of Alcoa¹s $150 million annual research budget is going into work on metals for the A380. "In the 1980s we were in a similar position developing materials for the Boeing 777. I believe the Airbus A380 will be the next showcase for our products."
Airbus is evaluating a range of Alcoa aerospace products for the A380. They include four different skins and two types of stringer for the fuselage, and two types of skin and two types of stringer for the wings.
Source: Flight Daily News
