Development of Continuous Ultrasonic Welding for the Automated Production of Aircraft Primary Structures

Advanced thermoplastic composites are a promising candidate for future single aisle airplanes. For such high- volume programs efficient, flexible and robust weld technologies are required that allow to benefit from melt fusible nature of high-performance matrix systems. At the Center for Lightweight Production Technology (ZLP) in Augsburg an ultrasonic weld end-effector has be designed and set up to promote continuous ultrasonic welding and mature this technology to a robot based industrial process. In this context, in-line process monitoring is essential to understand, improve and assure process performance. This work will give an insight to the current research activities in the field of ultrasonic welding of the DLR Augsburg.