Composites in use at Eurocopter in Donauwörth

Composites – high-strength and lightweight combinations of fiber materials – are playing an ever more important role in a wide range of industries. At a joint Catia Composite Roadshow organized by Dassault Systèmes and CENIT in May 2011, around  200 participants had the opportunity to take a close look at modern technologies for developing and manufacturing components from composite materials. The contribution by Eurocopter on how to successfully use digital product development in manufacturing aircraft doors met with particular interest.

• The history

  Eurocopter is a business segment of EADS, a global leader in the aerospace industry, defense contracting and associated services. In Donauwörth, Bavaria, the enterprise builds military and civilian helicopters as well as aircraft components. As a supplier, Eurocopter also manufactures aircraft doors for Airbus.
  
  In this sector, Eurocopter has traditionally relied on the PLM solution CATIA by French software maker Dassault Systèmes. As long ago as the early 90s, the enterprise introduced CATIA V3, then transited to CATIA V4 and most recently opted to upgrade to CATIA V5 to manage its product development.

• The project

  In the field of aircraft door manufacture, Eurocopter quickly realized that the topic of composites – high-strength and lightweight combinations of fiber materials – would play an increasingly important role. So the first task was to build up the requisite skills. Eurocopter relied on the know-how and the wide-ranging experience of experts from the consulting provider CENIT. Together, the partners developed a comprehensive design handbook containing detailed descriptions of how the CATIA V5 software can be efficiently harnessed for work on composites. Via associated services and training courses provided by CENIT, about 50 Eurocopter designers were brought up to speed on working effectively with the software.
  
  As a consequence, Eurocopter was the first Airbus supplier capable of manufacturing an aircraft door entirely from composites. One highlight was certainly the Airbus A350 project. All 8 passenger doors and the additional cargo door are delivered by Eurocopter. Because of the many complex components involved, the design of aircraft doors requires the interplay of different disciplines such as kinematics, integrated wiring, etc., as well as compliance with the high quality standards and requirements that apply in the aircraft industry.

• The bridge between engineering & manufacturing

  What makes Eurocopter special is that the enterprise managed to bring the design and manufacturing segments together. In pulling off this feat, a contributing factor was no doubt the fact that the CATIA software and the experts from Dassault Systèmes and CENIT were always on hand to support the holistic process. It’s enabled Eurocopter to deliver high-quality products while keeping development times and costs comparatively low.
  
  The crucial task was to build a bridge from engineering to manufacturing so as to achieve a uniform, integrated product development process. To guarantee loss-free downstream use of development data, Eurocopter opted to deploy DELMIA, another product by Dassault Systèmes. The 3D models created in CATIA during the design process can now be read out to DELMIA via the PDM system. In addition to the 3D models, DELMIA also imports process and resource data, which permits the generation of reports on throughput times, capacities, and busy times.

• The benefit

  The benefits are self-evident. Costing and scheduling can already be optimized during the planning phase. By integrating the development and manufacturing segments, impending changes can be forwarded at a very early stage, permitting high planning precision. Moreover, prototypes can be tested very early on, which in turn brings the production kick-off forward.

  This obvious range of added value was a key factor in gaining staff acceptance of the end-to-end software environment, because thanks to early digital simulation, the system eliminated or reduced the many reworking tasks that had to be done in the past. The process requires that colleagues from different disciplines work in tandem.
  

• The digital factory

  This is reflected in the complex production planning system at Eurocopter. Assembly planners, fixture designers, scheduling and logistics planners, cost planners, engineers and peripheral staff all produce a great wealth of data that has to be available in the latest version across the entire product lifecycle.

  The holistic Dassault Systèmes software environment and a central database ensure that the Eurocopter users stay on top of things and always have access to the data they need. As a result, the CATIA models generated by the developers and the SAP data from manufacturing can already be transferred to DELMIA during the inception phase. In this context, an important role falls to the digital factory.

  Here, methodologies were developed by creating structures, introducing standards and conducting analyses entirely in 3D. The processes established in this way have allowed Eurocopter to optimize throughput times and guarantee high quality standards.
  
  

• About Eurocopter

  Established in 1992, Eurocopter today is a German-French-Spanish corporation and a business segment of  EADS, a global leader in the aerospace industry, the defense sector, and associated services. Eurocopter Group employs about 17,500 staff. In 2010, the enterprise consolidated its position a world number one in the civilian and semi-public helicopter market with sales of 4.8 billion Euro, orders for 346 new helicopters and a 49-percent share of the civilian and semi-public market. In total, the Group’s products represent a 33-percent share of the entire global helicopter pool. The strong worldwide presence is supported by subsidiaries and holdings on five continents as well as a tightly woven network of sales partners, authorized dealers and maintenance centers. Currently, more than 11,200 Eurocopter aircraft are in service with over 2,900 customers in more than 147 countries. Globally, Eurocopter is the manufacturer with the widest range of civilian and military helicopters.

As Michael Salzmann, Engineering IT  and Wolfgang Schmidt, System Responsibility, Digital Factory both put it: “The digital factory method doesn’t solve problems, but it creates standards” – from development all the way to automated manufacturing.