ThermoStrut

The goal of the ThermoStrut project is the development of thermoplastic tension-compression struts with an integrated load introduction for applications in the aviation industry. The integration of the load introduction in the pultruded fiber-reinforced strut can be done either by a subsequent injection molding process or a combined forming/winding process. The combination of different thermoplastic processes results in a highly efficient low-cost design. The production of the strut by pultrusion results in an orientation of the fibers in line with the load path in the axial direction. Combined with the high impact resistance of thermoplastic matrix, this leads to an application-specific lightweight design. The digitized development of the design and production process enables the possibility to investigate the influence of various process parameters on the characteristics of the design. As a result, the optimal process parameters can be determined virtually, which significantly reduces the efforts for experimental investigations.

The project ThermoStrut enables the production of lowcost struts for the aviation-industry with optimized load transfer.