Composites

scaled and ARCA are both teams who do interesting stuff with composites, i'm wondering if i might have missed any other teams who use composites extensivly or are these two the only ones?

those are the only 2 i've heard about.

On the X-Prize website article there is a link to a company that seems to be designing a bipropellant engine with fiber composite cooling sleeve: http://www.rlaerospace.com/

Since this is a thread on technology and composites, I wanted to call attention to the issue of technical advantages/disavantages of composites versus metal.

In THE ROCKET COMPANY the authors (rocket professionals) find many problems with composite structures. They use as an example Rutan's STARSHIP design. They say that on big structures, composites loose weight savings and become to complex to manufacture. It seems to make sence. The Starship was an unsuccessfull comercial venture. The very similar Piaggio is a hot selling plane that was modernised to REMOVE the composites changing them for metal. Any comments.

This is the relevant link
http://www.hobbyspace.com/AAdmin/archiv ... page1.html

why do they use the example of starship (http://www.centennialofflight.gov/essay/GENERAL_AVIATION/beech/GA9G5.htm) instead of using the long-ez/varieze as an example? they sold thousands of those...

edit: sorry i see why but it's a bit of an unfair/tenuous comparison really:

quote taken from: http://www.centennialofflight.gov/essay/GENERAL_AVIATION/beech/GA9.htm
end edit

the above link was taken from this one: http://www.centennialofflight.gov/essay/GENERAL_AVIATION/rutan/GA15.htm

imo burtan's achievements proves them wrong on composites itself, that being said; making something out of composites doesn't necessarily make it a market hit (or the best product)

Pretty interesting. With a more flexible certification requierement you could update the Starship for 8 people and loose some weight and make a comercially viable design.

Also Scaled did a lot of work on the Rotary Rocket and it was a big ship.

I suppose if Rutan was more into mass market planes than into experimental designs we would see more big composite structures.

I'm interested in this topic because I studied Military Science and my Military Technology teacher said he did not expect big future advances in metallurgy for material science. He only expected them in composites. I did not know what to respond then, save for "titanium is cool".

There already ARE large composite structures being built. They're called boats.

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Greenmonster's post reminded me of the use composites have in Mine Countermeasure Vessels, warships used to destroy sea mines. Since the cmposite is not metallic it's safe against magnetic mines. Also has to be strong to resist shockwaves in the water. Should have remembered that.