Erica Weitz
Lisa Zimmermann
Vision Liao
Yu Yan
Fundamentals of Technology CCT 506
Dr. David Ribes and Dr. Evan Barba
TA: Cory Benavente
May 6, 2014
Written Report: CompositeCraft
Abstract
Aircraft manufacturers have used composites to construct aircraft for decades, but the
increased usage of the material in aircraft signals a transformation in the industry. Advocates
of the technology argue benefits such as fuel savings and a reduction in harmful emissions.
Others, like regulators, are concerned with potential safety vulnerabilities. Project
CompositeCraft explored this technology by de-blackboxing its parts. We examined previous
literature, interviewed manufacturing and regulatory experts and followed industry news.
CompositeCraft’s research illustrates mostly composite aircraft structures are part of a
sociotechnical system, which involves international and interdisciplinary collaboration in
order to advance this technology in safe, efficient, market-savvy way. This report presents
our findings about where the technology is today and hurdles on the horizon.
Introduction
Composites are not grand or necessarily new. Composites circle our daily centers.
The material is used to build structures both large and small – from airplanes to bathtubs.
“Many composites are made up of just two materials: one that acts like a glue to surround
and bind and one to reinforce, like fibers or fragments. When combined together, these
different materials usually work together to make the sum of the parts much better than the
original materials alone” (Dunbar, 2010).
Aircraft manufacturers have used composites to construct aircraft for decades, but the
increased usage in aircraft signals a transformation in the aviation industry. Our project,
Erica Weitz
Lisa Zimmermann
Vision Liao
Yu Yan
Fundamentals of Technology CCT 506
Dr. David Ribes and Dr. Evan Barba
TA: Cory Benavente
May 6, 2014
CompositeCraft aims to help the public understand the socio-technical implications wrapped
up and woven into mostly composite aircraft.
This report is structured into the following sections:

Content and Context

Research Approach

Summary of Project Components

Conclusions and Future Research

Survey Rational

Works Cited

Appendix with Supporting Documentation (Survey, Website Usability Report and
Presentation slides
Content and context
Our project’s research focused on aircraft made up of mostly composite parts. Since,
the content of our technology largely has to do with the material itself and how it advances
the performance of an aircraft, we first examined composite material.
Composites are simply a combination of two or more raw materials, which are made
up of different chemical properties. Man-made composites date back to 800 B.C. when straw
and mud were combined to first form bricks. “Fiber reinforced resin matrix materials (or
fiber reinforced composites as we know them today) were not developed until the early
1940's” (Tang, 1997). This combination can create structures that are strong, light and
durable. Composite parts typically include fiber reinforcements and resin. “The fibers
provide increased stiffness and tensile capacity. The resin offers high compressive strength
and binds the fibers into a firm matrix” (Tang, 1997). Composites made for aerospace
Erica Weitz
Lisa Zimmermann
Vision Liao
Yu Yan
Fundamentals of Technology CCT 506
Dr. David Ribes and Dr. Evan Barba
TA: Cory Benavente
May 6, 2014
structures frequently use thermosetting resins, such as epoxies, and carbon fibers because
they have “very high fatigue and creep resistance … the fibers can be chopped, woven,
stitched, and/or braided” (Tang, 1997).
Just as adopting the use of metal parts was gradual in the aviation industry, creating
aircraft structures with composite parts is also a continuous process (USGAO: United States
Government Accountability Office, 2011). “Until the 1930’s, wood was the primary material
used in aircraft construction. It was plentiful and cheap, had large bulk and strength for its
weight, and could easily be worked into any desired shape ... transition to all-metal
construction was gradual, … [due to] high costs of tooling and related retraining” (Ilcewicz,
2012, p. 3). During World War II, the government forced standardization of aluminum alloys
to quickly produce planes. Private, proprietary information became textbook material; this
benefited commercial airliners and manufacturers. This is different with composite designs,
which are still largely proprietary. Beginning in the 1970s through the 1980s, advanced
composite transport airframe structures were derived from NASA Prototype and military
applications (Ilcewicz, 2012). Previously, composites were mainly used in transit category
airplanes, in secondary structures and control surfaces. In 1988, Airbus introduced the first
aircraft with an all-composite tail. Now, manufacturers are using composites in airframe
structures (USGAO, 2011).
In the last 70 years, travel demand increased significantly. “Between 1955 and
2005/06 the number of passenger journeys on domestic flights grew twenty fold from 1.2
million to 25 million” (Bayliss, 2008, p.14). Additionally, rising fuel costs drove the industry
toward developing composite technology. Tim Neale at Boeing said fuel represents 40
percent of an airline’s operating cost. “Everybody really pushes hard for composite
Erica Weitz
Lisa Zimmermann
Vision Liao
Yu Yan
Fundamentals of Technology CCT 506
Dr. David Ribes and Dr. Evan Barba
TA: Cory Benavente
May 6, 2014
technology whenever the fuel costs go high because of the [associated] cost savings,” said
Larry Ilcewicz, Chief Scientific and Technical Advisor of Composites at the Federal Aviation
Administration (personal communication, April 17, 2014). Using composites can help
airlines lower their total direct operating costs by reducing fuel costs produced by the proven
weight savings and potentially reducing both manufacturing and maintenance costs and
(Ilcewicz, 2012). “Increasing [composite] use in commercial airplane structures such as the
fuselage and wings has raised safety concerns” (USGAO, 2011, p. 2). Building composite
aircraft also requires “high fabrication costs, substitution threat from metals and metal-matrix
composites, difficulties related to repair and recyclability as well as the lack of material
standardization” (Airline Industry Information, 2012).
Despite fuel savings, Ilcewicz said developmental costs are still a hurdle in advancing
the use of composites. Expenses played a big role in the development of the first mostly
composite commercial aircraft: the Boeing 787, a structure made up of 50 percent composite
material (Boeing, 2014). Ilcewicz said the two other big hurdles are resource dilution and
lack of standardization. “Boeing’s 787 is the first mostly composite large commercial
transport airplane to undergo the certification process,” where the FAA and the European
Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) evaluated airworthiness of composite structures against
safety standards (USGAO, 2011). The 787 was certified in 2011.
As commercial aircraft constructed primarily from composite materials take flight,
the context under which this technology continues to develop impacts the shape of its
technical contents. CompositeCraft’s research illustrates mostly composite aircraft structures
are part of a socio-technical system, which involves international and interdisciplinary
collaboration in order to advance this technology in safe, efficient, market-savvy way.
Erica Weitz
Lisa Zimmermann
Vision Liao
Yu Yan
Fundamentals of Technology CCT 506
Dr. David Ribes and Dr. Evan Barba
TA: Cory Benavente
May 6, 2014
Research Methods
To research the content and the context of our technology, we conducted a literature
review of academic and industry articles as well as design manuals. We conducted interviews
with a representative from Boeing and two chief scientists, who specialize in advanced
composites at the FAA*. In our next section, we expand upon the research methods we used
to produce each of our project’s components.
Summary of Project Components
Online Presence. CompositeCraft kept an ongoing online presence through both
WordPress and Twitter. Our website is designed to share and document our research, provide
news updates, answer questions about CompositeCraft and display our Twitter feed. The
website is broken into five pages: Home, Academic Materials, Blog, Design & Video and
Our Team. We explain each of these in detail in our Website Usability Study (see appendix).
Our website received recognition from the broader online community through the form of
“likes” to our pages.
On Twitter, we strategically followed 140 key players relevant to our technology,
such as NASA and Boeing. We tweeted more than 150 times and utilized #hashtags, which
helped us acquire nearly 60 followers. Twitter helped us stay up to date with our
technology’s progression and gave us a platform to promote our project’s findings.
Poster. Since our research subject lacked a tangible shape, it was difficult to make a
visual representation. Consequentially, we decided to turn to the sociotechnical system itself.
We displayed this with a central image of circles, which illustrated three forces jointly
shaping our technology: the airlines, the manufacturers and the regulators. Through creating
the poster, our understanding of the interrelationships shaping our technology grew clearer,
Erica Weitz
Lisa Zimmermann
Vision Liao
Yu Yan
Fundamentals of Technology CCT 506
Dr. David Ribes and Dr. Evan Barba
TA: Cory Benavente
May 6, 2014
which assisted our research. By displaying the content and the context and an illustration of
an aircraft in the middle, the poster illustrates an airplane is a “composite” of technological
and social forces formed in a non-linear fashion.
Postcard. We designed our postcard as a boarding pass so that anyone who receives
it can the connection to air travel. The postcard is more than a souvenir or flyer; it
summarizes our project with a correspondence about our project for you to share with friends
and families.
Interviews. The interviews we conducted with Tim Neale, Director,
Communications – Boeing, Lester Cheng, Aerospace Engineer – FAA, and Larry Ilcewicz,
Chief Scientific and Technical Advisor for Advanced Composite Materials – FAA, were a
crucial part of our project. Neale provided us with important insights relating to the businessside of mostly composite aircraft. Neale said Boeing had a lot of experience with composites,
but the biggest question prior to constructing the 787 Dreamliner (a twin-aisle aircraft) was
how could Boeing efficiently build such a large structure out of mostly composites? Neale
said, “You always have to be conscientious to what a transformation like this is going to do
to the cost of building an airplane … if it’s too high, no one is going to buy it even though it
provides fuel savings.” He said, Boeing takes the carbon-based materials and mixes them
with resin; “[then,] they are actually woven over a giant metal tube that is the size of the
fuselage and then they are baked in a giant oven to get very hard. All of this tooling... is very
expensive.”
Our interview with Neale led us to regulatory questions, which we were able to ask
the FAA’s Cheng and Ilcewicz, who helped develop and write Composite Materials
Handbook -17 (CMH-17). The handbook presents years of research and provides suggested
Erica Weitz
Lisa Zimmermann
Vision Liao
Yu Yan
Fundamentals of Technology CCT 506
Dr. David Ribes and Dr. Evan Barba
TA: Cory Benavente
May 6, 2014
guidelines for aircraft manufacturers working with composites. “The important thing [about]
this plan is that it is not just FAA or US plan, it is a ‘global plan.’ We work closely with
EASA, [our] European counterpart and Transport Canada Civil Aviation as well as industry
leaders,” Cheng said (personal communication, April 17, 2014). Ilcewicz named three
hurdles to our technology’s advancement: developmental costs, lack of standardization and
resource dilution.

Developmental Costs. Despite the fuel savings and potential manufacturing and
maintenance savings, the cost of composite material, and its ingredients (carbon fibers
and epoxies), is very expensive.

Lack of Standardization. Composite designs remain proprietary. Manufacturers have
similar standards, but there are differences among their designs. This is a safety concern.

Resource Dilution. How can students be trained
when the information they need cannot be taught
at universities? “Lack of composite
standardization and engineering resource dilution
pose serious safety and certification issues and
limit aircraft product applications,” (Ilcewicz,
2012, p.22; L. Ilcewicz, personal communication,
April 17, 2014).
Figure 1: The above slide was to the American Institute of
Aeronautics and Astronautics (Ilcewicz, 2012, p. 3).
Learning about these barriers was essential for understanding our technology and where it is
headed.
Video. Our video showcases key information from our interviews while displaying
complementary footage and photos. We surveyed individuals to determine if they knew
Erica Weitz
Lisa Zimmermann
Vision Liao
Yu Yan
Fundamentals of Technology CCT 506
Dr. David Ribes and Dr. Evan Barba
TA: Cory Benavente
May 6, 2014
composites were used in aircraft. They did not. Our video’s purpose is to inform viewers
about CompositeCraft and explain our technology’s relevance, evolution and possible future.
Survey. Our survey is directed toward aircraft designers. This component of the
project helped us structure questions prior to our interviews and consider future research
areas (See Survey Rationale).
Conclusion and Future Research
Composites are not necessarily grand, but they play an important role in the evolution
of aviation. The use of composites in aircraft, both commercial and military will continue to
evolve in a non-linear way. Right now, contractors like Lockheed Martin battle for
government contracts of mostly composite military aircraft and major manufacturers like
Boeing, Airbus and Bombardier compete for contracts with commercial carriers. If this
continues, information will remain proprietary, which will slow the technology’s
advancement and make it difficult to regulate. The 787 was the first mostly composite
commercial aircraft, but others, like the Airbus 350XWB, will follow.
Future areas of research include a further inspection of the regulatory-setting
processes and the implementation guidelines of these regulations. This paper scratches the
surface regarding regulations; we believe future research could examine situations like the
collaborative effort between the FAA, EASA and TCCA‘s efforts in creating CMH17. Studying efforts such as this and evaluating implementation techniques could reveal best
practices and unveil areas in need of expansion.
Erica Weitz
Lisa Zimmermann
Vision Liao
Yu Yan
Fundamentals of Technology CCT 506
Dr. David Ribes and Dr. Evan Barba
TA: Cory Benavente
May 6, 2014
Survey Rationale
Our survey targets aircraft designers specializing in composites. Due to the
proprietary nature of composite aircraft designs, we believed identifying each survey-taker’s
employer and the number of years he served was important to include in our data.
Interviewing Tim Neale of Boeing and reading industry literature helped us
understand why manufacturers are increasing the usage of composites in aircraft structures.
Throughout our research, three major benefits of composite structures were frequently noted;
these benefits include the material’s strength, durability and lightweight. Neale also
explained how the material’s expense and construction costs work against the advancement
of our technology. “We had to close the business case and figure out the procedures that
would allow us to economically manufacture the airplane and make multiple copies, … year
after year.” (T. Neale, personal communication, April 4, 2014). High material cost is one of
several barriers manufacturers face; other barriers include a lack of trained professionals and
a difficulty in determining damage. CompositeCraft’s survey created two, multiple-choice
questions to address these benefits and barriers, respectively. Each question also includes an
“Other” box for a survey-taker to fill in if he disagrees with the options we presented. This
data could assist research relating to the business-side of composite aircraft structures.
Many industry reports address that non-destructive Tests (NDT) are used to inspect
mostly composite aircraft so we developed a question to determine whether designers find
specific NDTs more reliable. We ask survey-takers to select the three NDTs (out of nine
listed) that he finds most reliable and then to rank the reliability of his three choices. Data
Erica Weitz
Lisa Zimmermann
Vision Liao
Yu Yan
Fundamentals of Technology CCT 506
Dr. David Ribes and Dr. Evan Barba
TA: Cory Benavente
May 6, 2014
gathered from this question could reveal trends among and within companies. For example,
Boeing employees might tend to select the same three NDTs, but these selections may differ
from those that Airbus designers select. This data could support provide a foundation for
research related to training materials, especially for designers who leave one manufacturer
for another. During our interview with Larry Ilcewicz of the FAA Ilcewicz discussed, “[We
worry] that someone would think they know more than they do, because [he’s] working on
the same type of aircraft for many, many years and all of a sudden is working on another one
that has some subtle differences, [yet he] applies what [he] knows - even though [he]
probably shouldn’t [do this]” (L. Ilcewicz, personal communication, April 17, 2014). This is
why we also thought it important to include a fill-in-the-blank question for survey-takers to
inform us where they trained.
Lastly, we wanted to ask each survey-taker what he believed was the biggest change
during his time working with composite aircraft structures. We designed this question to be
open-ended because we did not want to limit the responses we collected. Our research
pointed to multiple changes in the industry, but we felt it was important to investigate the
insider’s perspective. The results to this question could highlight changes that social
scientists, like us, might not have considered.
*The information presented in this paper from Ilcewicz and Cheng reflects information
that is public record and their opinions. Please see release documentation in our
supplemental materials packet for more information.
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Works Cited
787 Dreamliner. (2014, January 1). Boeing: Program Fact Sheet. Retrieved May 2, 2014,
from http://www.boeing.com/boeing/commercial/787family/programfacts.page
Bayliss, D. (2008, July 1). Travel Demand Increases and Its Causes. . Retrieved May 2,
2014, from
http://www.racfoundation.org/assets/rac_foundation/content/downloadables/roads%20an
d%20reality%20-%20bayliss%20-%20travel%20demand%20and%20its%20causes%20%20150708%20-%20background%20paper%203.pdf
Demand for lighter aircraft driving aviation composites demand. (2012). Airline Industry
Information, Retrieved from
http://search.proquest.com/docview/1151847487?accountid=11091
Dunbar, B. (2010, September 15). NASA 360 Season 2, Show 17. NASA. Retrieved May
2, 2014, from http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/podcasting/nasa360/nasa360-0217.html
Ilcewicz, Larry. "Composite Safety Administration and Certification Initiatives." AIAA
SDM Conference. Honolulu, HI. 23 Apr. 2012. Keynote speech.
Red, Chris. "Aviation Outlook: Composites in General Aviation 2011-2020." HighPerformance Composites May (2012): n. pag. Composites World. Web. 1 May 2012.
Tang, Benjamin. "Fiber Reinforced Polymer Composites Applications in USA." the First
Korea/U.S.A. Road Workshop Proceedings January (1997): n. pag. fhwa.dot.gov. Web.
28 Jan. 1997.
United States Government Accountability Office. (2011). Aviation Safety: Status of
FAA’s Actions to Oversee the Safety of Composite Airplanes (GAO-11-849).
Washington, D.C: U.S. Government Accountability Office.
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Fundamentals of Technology CCT 506
Dr. David Ribes and Dr. Evan Barba
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Appendix
Survey Questions
Our survey questions are listed below. We also posted our survey questions online
through Survey Monkey: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/HP35NBK.
5/5/2014
CompositeCraft - Composite Design Survey
CompositeCraft -­ Composite Design Survey
*1. What company do you work for and for how how many years?
2. How many years have you specialized in composite aircraft structures?
*3. Much of our research discusses how the proprietary nature of composite aircraft
designs is a hurdle standing in the way of advancing the use of composites in
aircraft structures. As a designer, where do you stand on this issue? Agree or
disagree.
Agree
Disagree
*4. Please explain why you agree or disagree to the question above.
*5. Of the following, which do you believe is the biggest benefit to increasing the
amount of composites used in aircraft?
The light weight of the material
The strength of the material
The durability of the material
Other (please specify)
*6. Of the following, which do you believe is the biggest deterrent to increasing the
amount of composites used in aircraft?
The expense of composite materials
A lack of trained professionals to work with this material
The difficulty in detecting damage within the materials
Other (please specify)
https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/HP35NBK
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CompositeCraft - Composite Design Survey
*7. What type of non­destructive testing do you think is the most reliable? Select up
to three options.
­Ultrasonic inspection
Xray inspection
Visual Inspection
Tap Testing
A­Scan
C­Scan
ANDSCAN
Thermography
High Tech Tap Tester
Other (please specify)
*8. Please rank the order in the three non­destructive testing methods you selected
above in Question #7.
*9. Where did you train to work on composite materials?
Your current company
Through the FAA's training classes
Other (please specify)
*10. Since working in aviation, what is the biggest change you have seen with regard
to composite structures?
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Lisa Zimmermann
Vision Liao
Yu Yan
Fundamentals of Technology CCT 506
Dr. David Ribes and Dr. Evan Barba
TA: Cory Benavente
May 6, 2014
Website Usability Study
Website usability evaluation – CompositeCraft
We developed our WordPress website to strategically share and document our research,
provide news updates and answer questions about CompositeCraft in a clear and concise
fashion. We structured and designed our website to mirror our strategic goals. To do this,
we opted for a simple, clean and clear-cut website design through Wordpress. On our
website, CompositeCraft.wordpress.com, we provide viewers information, news and our
own research in an easy to navigate web space.
Our website is broken into five distinguishable pages:
1) Home. Our homepage explains the mission and research goals of CompositeCraft.
2) Academic Materials. This page hosts our literature review, presentation, this
report, survey and release forms. A user may select which piece of information he
wishes to view from the drop down menu we offer on our page.
3) Blog. Here we can interact with readers, share news updates and answer
questions. Each new blog post is marked with a clear headline.
4) Design & Video. This page provides another layer of engagement by showcasing
our project’s visual elements: poster, postcard, video interview transcript and
video.
5) Our Team. Here we briefly explain our team member’s backgrounds.
Match the System and the Real World:
Our website contains words, phrases and concepts that our users would understand. The
topic of mostly composite aircraft can be very complex and technical, but our team
features information that clearly defines hard concepts and answers common questions.
Furthermore, we clearly mark headlines and to information relating to any complex topic
where users can explore additional information (Examples 5 and 6).
User Control and Freedom:
Links to all five of our pages as well as all of our deliverables appear on each page. This
design affords users the ability to navigate back and forth between pages. Additionally,
all PDFs that are linked from any of our website’s pages will open in the same window
for the viewer to read immediately. However, if the user accidently clicks on the PDF
link, the user need only to hit “back” to return to our website (Example 4).
Recognition rather than recall:
On our website, the header, with all our deliverables and pages, is visible from every
page (Example1). Similarly, all of our recent blog posts and Twitter posts appear on the
right hand side of each page (Example 2). Upon clicking one of the links, the title of the
page is clearly labeled so the user does not need to remember what he clicked (Example
2). Designing our website with these features always visible makes our web presence
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Lisa Zimmermann
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Fundamentals of Technology CCT 506
Dr. David Ribes and Dr. Evan Barba
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May 6, 2014
transparent to users. Users can immediately see these features and recognize them as a
“map” from which they can navigate our website.
Aesthetic and Minimalist Design:
We provide only the relevant, important information on each page. We avoid cluttering
the header by keeping the number of tabs concise. In under to cut down on the clutter, we
opted for drop down tabs beneath each of our pages (Examples 1 and 3). We avoided
using overwhelming users with too many colors or images, especially on our blog.
Instead, we strategically choose only to display photos, graphs and hyperlinks that are the
most relevant and useful to readers (Examples 5 and 6).
Consistency and Standards:
Headline and link formats are consistent throughout the site. Additionally, if a user clicks
on the blog, the website address in the browser will change to:
http://compositecraft.wordpress.com/blog/. This consistency allows the user to share a
specific page, or blog, from our site (Example 6).
Example 1: Our website’s pages are visible and easy to spot.
Example 2: Recent blog posts and Twitter updates appear on the right hand column on
every page of our website.
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Fundamentals of Technology CCT 506
Dr. David Ribes and Dr. Evan Barba
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Example 3: Dropdown menu a user will see when he clicks on a page.
Example 4: If a user is viewing one of our PDF components, he may hit back to return to
the previous page.
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Fundamentals of Technology CCT 506
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Example 5: Concise blog entry with one key message and image.
Example 6: The purple arrow illustrates a unique web address. The red arrow points out
where a user can see his website location.