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Capabilities

Composite Solutions: Naval

Composite Solutions: Naval

Design Services

Tods Defence and its team of Design, Analysis and Manufacturing engineers, brings a broad knowledge base in maritime composite materials and processes to the Unitech group, providing solutions to Naval Composite problems that vary in both scale and complexity. We offer particular expertise in the following areas:

  • Composite Materials Engineering
  • Composite Design Analysis
  • Structures design – linear, nonlinear, dynamic shock analysis
  • Acoustics design – transmission loss, pressure wave modelling, beamforming predictions
  • RF design – transmission loss, scattered energy, joint IFR
  • 3D CAD Design
  • Design for Manufacture
  • Integrated Systems Design

Our Engineering skills can be deployed as standalone design or development support or embedded within an integrated design and manufacture offering and these both provide full documentation and Design Authority functions where required. The smooth running and quality of project deliverables is ensured via dedicated project management, comprehensive gate reviews, audited procedures/documentation control and full product lifecycle management.

Development Services

Tods Defence has an internal Research and Development team dedicated to the constant improvement of our materials, processes testing and products. We also develop our own manufacturing equipment for internal and customer use.

  • De-risking
  • Improving reliability and quality
  • Mitigating skill dependencies
  • Tool design and production
  • Productionisation techniques

Manufacturing Techniques

Tods Defence offers the following techniques in the Naval Composite domain:

Resin Film Infusion - a high fibre, low void content solution with excellent mechanical properties cured under vacuum in an oven at elevated temperature. Potentially lower cost alternative than pre-preg, but with most of the advantages, widely used within Marine applications for large thick parts.

  • Sonar domes
  • Fairings
  • Submarine masts

Vacuum Infusion - A cost effective process undertaken under vacuum at room temperature for making high quality large composite parts, high glass content, giving higher specific strength and stiffness, good interior finish, faster cycle time and lower cost tooling.

  • Submarine tailcones
  • Air Vehicle components
  • Submarine fairings

Hand Lay - an open moulding method, suitable for making a wide variety of composite products from very small to very large. It is the simplest composite moulding process, offering a low cost tooling method, simple processing and a wide range of part sizes.

  • Radomes – epoxy resin/quartz
  • Moulds
  • Dome internal components
  • Small marine items

Acoustic material Production - Tods Defence produces a wide range of acoustic materials, ranging from individual tiles and baffles, to coatings to achieve specific acoustic properties.

The materials are bespoke to each application and are tuned for performance to meet the exacting specifications of our customers. Our Acoustic and Sonar department uses state of the art Finite Element Analysis, meshing and in house developed software tools for acoustic design and simulation of our products. We also produce test and qualification samples to validate our designs before and during production runs.

Acoustic materials application - compounds for coating marine Defence applications, in particular for the reduction of radiated noise in water or encapsulation of sensors with acoustically transparent materials. Underwater acoustics covers a wide frequency range, from a few kHz up to several hundred.

  • Mobile site casting capability
  • Acoustically transparent SONAR domes and windows
  • Rho C infill and casting
  • Echo reduction baffles and tiles
  • Cast submarine sensor covers
  • Submarine and ship baffle tiles
  • In-house overmoulding of sensors

CAPABILITIES

Composite Solutions: Naval
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