Converting the clave 

In this Q&A session, Scott Dyson, group sales manager for Premier Autoclaves, speaks to Ed Hill about its upgrading services for autoclaves used widely in the composite industry.

Q) Can you give us some background about Premier Autoclaves? How did the business start? What are the services you offer?

Premier was formed out of a need in the industry for autoclave service and support specialists. Today, we remain the only company to focus purely on customers’ existing autoclaves and ovens with services encompassing: autoclave upgrades; service agreements; calibration; temperature uniformity surveys (Nadcap, AMS2750E, etc.); rapid response breakdown support; operator training; autoclave relocation and insurance inspection.

Q) Why are autoclaves needed when curing composite materials? Is there healthy demand for more autoclaves and for the upgrade services you provide?

Autoclaves are strategically indispensable to most composite manufacturers as consistency, quality and particularly traceability of cured parts is central to their business. Autoclaves are in effect, 3D presses with - at the top end - sophisticated controls and hardware allowing for exact application of heat and pressure. Complete traceability (in more advanced systems) throughout this process combined with consistency of production have kept autoclaves at the forefront of low to mid-volume production. Premier has seen a very healthy increase in demand for upgrading autoclaves across aerospace, automotive and motorsport sectors within the last 18 months, hopefully reflecting the reputation of Premier, and certainly reflecting the industry growth as well as the importance of autoclaves.

Q) Are there new sectors and processes where autoclaves are beginning to be used?

Whilst industries (other than composites) such as glass, rubber, casting and thermalite block all use autoclaves, these are not new processes. Rather, these industries are taking fresh approaches to their use. Particularly, the importance of traceability and understanding how products are being cured is coming to the fore. This is important - not only to prove a part’s integrity and ensure processes are followed - it’s also assisting to enhance part quality through intuitive curing, improving cure efficiency and providing hardware feedback.

Q) How have autoclaves evolved over the years in the sophistication of the control (heat and pressure) and monitoring/data processes?

Premier work on all brands of autoclaves and have seen varied developments across the board. Automation has been the most obvious and most widespread improvement; minimising the need for operator interaction after cure selection and pressing ‘go’. Thermal head curing (whilst a good few years old now) has been a great addition to control; increasing efficiency and accuracy of cure by allowing air temperature to increase beyond part temperature on ramp ensuring part follows set point accurately. Beyond this, the possibilities with data processing, monitoring, automated reports and so on are endless and we regularly write bespoke code for customers to enable cost-saving measures, such is the flexibility of Premier’s software.

Q) Can all autoclaves be upgraded and how do you assess a project?

In short, assuming the vessel is safe, any autoclave can generally be upgraded. Premier have upgraded all manner of autoclaves from top spec 2014 continental machines right through to autoclaves from the 1970s. From the outset, assessing a project is driven by both ours, and our customers’ needs. We evaluate how best to maximise an autoclave’s potential in terms of efficiency, safety and performance and using our expertise offer bespoke proposals.

Q) Is there an average time for an upgrade?

Following extensive planning and prior off-site building of elements, such as control and vacuum panels all upgrades take place onsite without the need for removal of vessel. This minimises on-site disruption. Every upgrade is different in terms of timescale, depending on whether it is front end controls, whole machine, cooling only, etc.

Q) Is it possible to reduce curing times for composite components in the autoclave?

Production increase goes hand in hand with autoclave-efficiency improvements. Whilst cycle times and parameters are dictated by the materials being cured and their resin systems, Premier works with customers to help them better understand airflow and autoclave thermal-dynamics through comprehensive traceability. To give a few examples of benefits of updating old systems (and more pertinently manually run systems); cures are more intuitive, follow set point better, use thermal head to avoid overshoot at ramp end and are generally more cost-effective with drastically reduced operator involvement. One recent upgrade resulted in the customer going from being able to cure once/twice per day with a manual autoclave system to undertaking four cures every day.

Q) Does the introduction of ‘out of autoclave’ processes mean autoclaves will eventually not be required for composites?

From discussions with our customers out of autoclave processes are becoming more prolific and will continue to develop. That being said the resounding message is that autoclaves are here to stay for small and medium volume runs. The two elements which are of vital importance for most customers are traceability and consistent quality which cannot be matched by presses, ovens and the like so autoclave remains the preferred route for this type of work. More than that, autoclave curing by its very nature is a batch process suitable for parts with varied contours and complex shapes. This can be a completely different size, recipe, temperature, pressure, vacuum from one cycle to the next and it’s simply a case of pressing ‘go’. Therein lies the flexibility of an autoclave.

Q) How do you see the development of autoclaves in the future? Will technologies, such as remote monitoring and other Industry 4.0 type advances have an impact?

Control systems, such as Premier’s CureManager enable a great level of automation and our regular iterations ensure continual improvements for customers. Clearly, automation is an exciting and vital development as composites manufacturing continues to develop on at a rate of knots. On this point, Premier work with so many of our customers to minimise ‘at autoclave’ time, provide cost-efficiency and risk-mitigation benefits.

An example of a monitoring system about to be rolled out is with GTR, one of the country’s leading composite suppliers into motorsport, automotive OEMs, defence and aerospace (supplying anything from chassis to visual lacquered parts). Once installed, this will be one of the most sophisticated remote monitoring systems Premier has seen in the industry, including the ability to view and manipulate cures from any desktop, automated email reporting systems, SMS and email alarms and a live Display Node. The Display Node will provide a rolling live feed from all autoclave PCs on a large television screen within the engineering office. Here physical ‘at autoclave’ time is reduced, risk of part loss is mitigated dramatically for GTR and its customers and automation increased. This is real forward-thinking by GTR and a great example of autoclave development.

Beyond this, developmental ideas include microwave curing within autoclaves, thermocouples embedded in tools and product and Premier also has an autoclave energy recovery system patented and in development- a very exciting project.

You can view Premier Autoclaves talking about their autoclave upgrades at: https://www.composites.media/premier-autoclaves-shades-upgrades/

www.premierautoclaves.com