Tooling
Primary
Tooling: Scaled Composites has the facilities
necessary to produce tooling for composite parts very quickly
and accurately. The primary tool is a 5-axis numerically
controlled (NC) gantry router. This machine can work within
a 50' X 20' X 8' envelope. It is able to machine foam or
other tooling materials of densities up to 50 lb/ft3. (more
information)
Accurate Tooling from 3D CAD:
Scaled can accept CAD surfaces of many different formats
(IGES being the most popular) from customers to use in part
definition. This data is used to create CATIA surfaces,
which are then used to generate tool-path information that
is fed to the NC machine. Using these techniques, very accurate
tools can be built.
Hard and Soft Tooling: Rapid
production of 'soft' tooling allows Scaled to proceed from
design to actual layups very rapidly. If desired, production-quality
hard tools can be constructed from plugs that are made on
the NC machine.
Tooling for Diverse Projects: While
the NC capability is vital to nearly all of our projects
here at Scaled, some customers approach us only for our
tooling ability. Projects have included homebuilt aircraft
parts, sailplane tooling and propellers. The NC room is
also home to many non-aerospace applications. Projects including
prototype automobiles, solar cars, models of various types,
boat components and cannon molds have been tooled here at
Scaled.
From cars to spaceships, Scaled Composites
is able to rapidly produce tooling that will keep our customer's
projects on time.
Next
page: Fabrication
