Fiber Patch Placement enables industrial tank reinforcements to reduce weight, cost and production time

Automation specialist Cevotec will present the latest trends and industry solutions of its unique Fiber Patch Placement (FPP) technology for complex composites at CAMX in San Diego, from September 9 to 12, 2024, at booth MM15.

Finalist for the Combined Strength Award

Together with project partners Roth Composite Machinery and CIKONI, Cevotec is nominated for the CAMX Combined Strength Award 2024 for dome reinforcements of composite tanks. In this industry project, the partners demonstrated savings of 15% less fiber material while simultaneously increasing the storage efficiency of the H2 tank by 17%, at equivalent mechanical properties. The fiber material was placed on the domes using Cevotec’s FPP technology, the first fully automated lay-up technology to efficiently place reinforcement patches directly on tank liners.

“We are delighted to be nominated for the award with this project,” comments Thorsten Groene, CEO and Co-Founder of Cevotec. “The composite shell is still the largest cost reduction opportunity, presenting over 60% of total cost of tank storage systems. Together with our partners, we have successfully demonstrated the savings potential of dome reinforcements for type IV composite tanks in an industrial context. With Fiber Patch Placement technology, manufacturers now have a powerful tool at hand to implement reinforcements also in large-scale series production. This reduces not only cost, but also the CO2 footprint of tanks significantly.”

Cevotec’s technical expert Dr. Dimitrios Sikoutris will present insights of the project at the CAMX Conference, Wednesday Sep 11, 1:30 – 2:25 pm: ‘Composite tanks innovation: 15% weight reduction by using dome reinforcements in an industrial process’. Visitors have also the opportunity to explore a cut-out of a project vessel in the CAMX Award Area.

Advanced composite vessels with SAMBA Pro PV – Less weight, more storage efficiency

Additionally to a physical demonstrator, Cevotec will digitally present the new SAMBA Pro PV, the industrial solution for dome reinforcements of pressure vessels. The system is dedicated to applying carbon fiber patches in the dome areas – fully automated, precise, quality controlled and efficient. Given the reinforcements on the domes, the subsequent winding process can omit certain helical layers, so overall, less material is needed to achieve necessary structural properties. Next to the reduced weight, this gives manufacturers the opportunity to increase absolute volume within the same outer diameter.

In addition, using less material in the winding process increases the capacity of the production line and thereby the overall output, efficiency and profitability of the production. SAMBA Pro PV for dome reinforcements can be combined with all established wet or towpreg winding processes and comes with software to design the reinforcements and create robot data for the equipment fully automated. At CAMX, Cevotec offers manufacturers the opportunity to evaluate their individual savings potential by analyzing presented tank designs.

Complex composite aerostructures – Bridging the gap between AFP and hand lay-up

Cevotec will also show its latest development for the aerospace industry with SAMBA Pro Multi, the FPP solution for complex geometries, multi-material processing and locally adapted fiber designs of aerospace parts. The FPP system for aerostructures offers potential savings in material, cycle time and cost from 20% to 60% for relevant applications compared to legacy processes. Visitors can learn about results from an aerospace project retrofitting the lay-up of horizontal tail plane (HTP) fairing on a legacy tool with FPP automation. This resulted in a more than 7-fold acceleration of the project component. The Cevotec team will showcase a video demonstrating the new placement features of our SAMBA system that enables this significant lay-up acceleration.

“With Fiber Patch Placement, we are closing a significant gap in high-performance lay-up automation. FPP technology finally bridges the chasm between established AFP and hand lay-up, providing an efficient option especially for multi-material placement on complex surfaces. The technology also works well for automation retrofits in legacy program, as the successful results of our latest project show”, adds Technical Expert Dr. Dimitrios Sikoutris with a view to the trade fair.

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