MFFD

Aluminium has been the go-to material for aircraft construction for many years, with continuous improvements in production. However, with the focus now on sustainability and climate-friendly aviation, new solutions are needed. To showcase the revolutionary possibilities in materials and production, the German Aerospace Centre (DLR) has collaborated with Premium AEROTEC, Airbus, and Aernnova to develop a fuselage component made entirely of carbon fibre reinforced thermoplastic.

This special plastic, LM_PAEK, not only makes the component more damage-tolerant but also reduces its weight by approximately one tonne compared to the aluminium counterpart. The development involved ground-breaking technologies for cost-efficient, resource-saving processes with minimal energy consumption.

As part of the European research programme Clean Sky-2, a