New materials for efficient aircraft design

With airlines across the world facing significant cost pressures, manufacturing materials are coming under intense scrutiny as carriers seek to make savings. Using magnesium for non-structural applications will help reduce the weight of aircraft and improve efficiency, as Amir Fein of the MagForming project explains.

 The global financial crisis is hitting business hard, and the airline sector is no exception. Demand is uncertain, leading major carriers to search for cost savings wherever they can, including the materials used in the aircraft manufacturing process. “The price of crude oil has not been stable over recent years with significant highs, so major airlines are looking to reduce the weight of their aircraft,” explains Amir Fein, the administrative coordinator of the MagForming (Development of New Magnesium Forming Technologies for the Aeronautics Industry) project. MagForming is an EU-funded project aiming to advance the technology involved in the plastic processing of wrought magnesium alloys which, for aeronautical applications, could lead to significant cost savings.

“One of MagForming’s most important objectives is to encourage the use of a variety of materials in aircraft, so that we aren’t dependent on the conventional metallic materials which are being used today,” continues Fein. The project aims not to replace (as yet) the wings, frame or fuselage but, for example, door inner panels and air system components. “To illustrate, if you have 200 seat frames in an aircraft all made out of a certain aluminium alloy, and you are able to replace it with a magnesium component, then the weight of the seat frame is reduced by approximately 30 per cent.”

The resulting increased efficiency of aircraft would hopefully mean savings for passengers as well as airlines. “In most cases we’re trying to adopt existing technologies in order to form materials,” Fein says. “Big manufacturers may well be aware of magnesium’s key attributes – the fact that it is lightweight, has high specific strength and excellent damping capacity – but typically they do not want to invest in expensive new equipment to form it. We’re trying to employ the same tools for processing magnesium as we do today for aluminium.” The fact that magnesium has even been considered for aeronautical applications once again (it declined in popularity after the 60s) is an achievement in itself.

Fein concludes: “As the MagForming project approaches its end we can already say that most of its objectives have been fully obtained and that commercial talks have started with several aeronautic companies regarding certain magnesium applications."

Contact Yonatan Henn, Technological Coordinator, at info@magnesium-technologies.com

Published: Monday, 9th November 2009

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