Originally posted by CathayPacific
use of composites, or carbon fiber in general is not new. In the article above you can read about a few aircraft that have used a significant amount of composites in their creation.
Every day I spend about 8 hours watching my students beat the hell out of a Diamond Katana which is made of two composites. The skin is made of glas reinforced plastic (fiberglass) and the load bearing structure is made of carbon fiber reinforced plastic, which if I'm not mistaken is what the 787 will be using a lot of.
Actually, the airplane I fly almost exclusively just went in for its 100 hour. I've been flying the airplane a whole lot lately working on a lot of student landings. We found out that the landing gear must be replaced because it is bent. Guess what the gear is made of? Aluminum.
While it is true that when composites fail, they will break entirely, that isn't exactly a bad thing. If a composite is in one piece, that means it is structurally sound because it does not deform like aluminum does.
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