Composite Materials State of the Market

Composite materials have been key for helping many companies differentiate their products by reducing weight, improving performance, and lowering the cost of ownership. However, with the expense of composite material, companies must find ways to make better decisions to optimize the amount of composite material used to achieve performance requirements, without over-engineering while also maintaining profitability.

Growth In Composite Materials Usage

In addition to the number of programs using composites, the amount of composite material used will also grow. Over the next 15 years, those using composites anticipate the amount of composite material will continue to grow for both high-end and mid-tier products.

Realizing Opportunities with Composite Materials

Improving product performance is by far the top goal for light weighting, followed by improving fuel economy, and then improving product safety. This shows that companies are relying on composites as a key way to improve products in ways that will improve differentiation.

Challenges with Composite Materials

Manufacturing challenges are the biggest cost driver. These include slower production and wasted material and scrap. This is followed by the cost of composite material and engineering challenges, which are nearly equivalent. Engineering challenges include poor communication between design engineers and manufacturing, poor communication of manufacturing challenges, cost of material engineering challenges between design and analysis, and over-engineering. Interestingly, addressing the engineering challenges will help the manufacturing challenges as well. By improving communication between the different groups, and giving engineers better insight into manufacturing, they can make better design decisions to improve production and reduce scrap. Also, limiting the amount of over-engineering will reduce material costs.