Manufacture
Composite Processing Methods
Bladder moulding - Thermoset
A process where composite materials are consolidated against tooled surfaces using air pressure. This process provides parts with one tooled surface.
Compression Moulding - Thermoset
A process there a hollow mould tools is filled with composite materials and compressed to provide detail on all surfaces.
Stamping - Thermoplastic
A process where thermoplastic materials are heated to become malleable, then rapidly stamped into a mould tool. The part quickly cools to retain is moulded shape. This process is suitable for high volume low cost parts.
Pultrusion - Thermoplastic : A process there thermoplastic composite materials are pulled through heated dies then cooled to manufacture continuous lengths of product.
Winding - Thermoplastic
Continuous long fibre composite tape is wrapped and simultaneously heated and consolidated to manufacture tubular composite structures. The process can provide high degrees of compressive load in the structure suitable for high internal pressure applications
Presses
C2 uses presses for containment and heating of mould tools, there are no autoclaves on site. This allows us to respond quickly and run specific cure schedules for the parts being manufactured.
Manually operated, electrically heated, both flat and stepped ranging in size from 700x800mm to 1400x900mm
All cure schedules are programmable and recordable
Material Handling and cutting
In thermoset component manufacture C2 uses pre-impregnated ("Pre-pregs") materials. This is where the resin is impregnated into the composite fibres prior to lay-up and moulding. The resin and fibres have very specific and controlled configurations. These materials then have a limited "out life" and must be held in cold storage, prior to use.
For accuracy and consistency all materials are CNC or die cut.
Machining
C2 has a range of machine shop equipment including large and small CNC vertical mills, lathes, EDM (spark erosion) surface grinding. This capability allows us to manufacture our tooling in house and conduct precision machining on all parts
