Carbures completes the industrial process loop of carbon fiber

A new repair facility is available, from today, at the R&D&I plant of the Group, located in El Puerto de Santa María.

The company diversifies its activities with this new business line and becomes the first Group to offer a full manufacturing and repair service in Spain.

Carbures has the necessary technology required to offer repair services, called Sicoteva, a kind of "electric blanket", which is laid over the area to be repaired. It applies heat to that area and hardens it.

Madrid, February 4, 2015. Carbures completes the industrial process loop of carbon fiber. The Company has launched a new business line, the repair of composite parts and structures, that complements the manufacturing one, thus offering a full technological-industrial service to the market. The new repair facility of the R&D&I plant of the Group, which is located in El Puerto de Santamaría, provides its services, initially, in the aerospace sector.As a result of the demand and the non-existent supply of this service, Carbures, which have already carried out some exceptional repairs for some of its clients, launches this new business line for the aerospace sector.

Currently, Carbures already has the necessary technology to repair carbon fiber parts. It is a meticulous process, almost a handcrafted one, carried out by real experts in manipulating carbon fiber. Once the part has been repaired, it is subject to a hardening treatment by applying a technology called Sicoteva, a kind of "electric blanket", which is laid over the area to be repaired. It applies heat to that area and hardens it.

The repair facility is currently in the process of certification, which is necessary to carry out these auxiliary services. These services not only includes appearance repairs but also structural repair processes with curing in an autoclave ( a big oven where parts are inserted inside ther molds to harden them).

"By completing the industrial process loop of carbon fiber with our new repair service, we continue to accomplish our organic growth strategy and to generate synergies among the various companies of the Group. This a step forward in our growth roadmap, it consolidate us as a reference Tier 2 in the market", said today the President of the Company, Rafael Contreras.

In this way, Carbures is the first Tier 2 supplier in Spain offering a full service not only to the top aircraft manufacturers but also to the Tier 1 suppliers (not only their clients but all the market agents).

Carbon fiber repairs

There are two types of repairs of parts made of carbon fiber: appearance and structural repairs. The appearance repairs, as their name suggests, are those in which the part is valid in terms of size, fitting and shape, but has been damaged during the manufacturing process, having a mark, scratch or something similar. The structural ones are those in which the part has not been perfectly made during the manufacturing process and needs to be polished. This happens to about x percent of the parts manufactured from carbon fiber. The parts can be repaired instead of rejecting them. Unlike the other manufacturers of the composites sector, Carbures has the necessary industrial and technological capacity to offer this new repair service and thus it continues to grow in the aerospace industry.