Out of autoclave composite consolidation processes have been of significant interest to the aircraft manufacturing industry for the past few years, where the demand is for very low porosity, high-quality manufactured parts produced at high speed and a minimal cost. This paper presents the latest advances obtained by combining Coriolis Composites Technologies automated fiber placement (AFP) with an innovative low melt polyaryletherketone unidirectional thermoplastic composite tape manufactured by Victrex (VICTREX AE 250 UDT). In this work a state-of-the-art laser assisted AFP head was used to produce in-situ and oven consolidated laminated panels. Porosity content, degree of crystallinity and interlaminar shear strength were measured for each consolidation method and the results are presented here. Manufacturing settings were explored, leading to very low porosity content, an acceptable degree of crystallinity and good interlaminar shear strength. The combination of Coriolis AFP and Victrex material showed significant improvements in terms of manufacturing performances.
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