Mary-Louise Hoffman
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is seeking industry expertise to identify new methods to reduce the cycle time in the production of military system components that weigh less than 20 pounds.
Mick Maher, program manager at DARPA’s defense sciences office, said Monday the agency aims to shorten the composite material tooling and manufacturing process from six years to three years through the Tailorable Feedstock and Forming initiative.
DARPA asked the private sector to propose reconfigurable forming and molding techniques for aerospace-grade components as well as technologies to build multiple part configurations from a common work cell.
“If we’re successful, this program should reduce the weight of military systems by making composite parts as affordable as metal, eliminate the lengthy and costly re-tooling burden and open new design space for small composite parts,†Maher added.
The agency will hold a proposers day for interested TTF program participants on Tuesday.
