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Rotherham-based engineering consultancy Bennett Associates has
won a top award from the prestigious Institute of Materials for its contribution
to the development of the Airbus A380 'super-jumbo', which is due to make its
maiden flight next year.
The Institute awards its Gold Medal for important contributions to
the industrial application of materials. This year it chose the team responsible
for the manufacture of the top skins of the A380 wings, which will measure
around 40 metres from wing-tip to fuselage. The aircraft will carry 555
passengers.
The process used to produce the four skins for each wing, known
as creep age forming, had never been used before on this scale and would
normally require a long time to develop, producing unacceptable delays in the
A380 programme. The skins panels also had to be formed to very precise
tolerances, and the accuracy of creep age forming on this scale was unknown.
Bennett Associates was appointed by Airbus UK to design the
tooling and handling systems for the wing skins and project-manage their
construction and installation at a new factory in North Wales. This equipment
cost £7.7 million.
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