Thank You for a Successful Symposium!
Our Annual Technical Symposium took place at the Museum of Flight on November 10th! As usual we had a wide variety of topics and speakers in parallel sessions, a discussion panel, a rising leader keynote and speed mentor sessions. Breakfast and lunch was provided and we ended the day with a afternoon social.
See the final program for this year’s Tech Symposium!
Our morning keynote speaker was Dr. Jan Vandenbrande, presenting “Towards Next Generation Aerospace Design and Manufacturing”. The presentation covered the topics being addressed by the DARPA FUN Design, TRADES and TFF programs:
- Conceptual design is largely an artisan activity that involves finding combinations of physical behaviors to achieve a desired function. Are there new ideas from physics, mathematics and computer science that could help us explore this space better?
- There has been tremendous progress in architected materials and advanced manufacturing process (e.g., 3D printing) over the last couple of decades. However, are we really leveraging these innovations and are we designing things any differently?
- Carbon fiber reinforced composites are strong and lightweight materials that have given us many benefits. However, 50-80% of most “composite” aircraft are still made out of heavier metal, which means we are leaving potential performance on the table. Why is that and what can we do to change that?
Our lunch keynote speaker was Dr. Robert “Bob” Winn, mechanical/aeronautical engineer, Principal and Chairman of the Board of Engineering Systems Inc. (ESI).
“New Tools in Aircraft Accident Reconstruction” by Dr. Bob Winn
An engineering approach to accident reconstruction really began approximately 40 years ago with Bach and Wingrove, who developed a technique for estimating aircraft performance using recorded radar data for NASA. Recent improvements in their approach will be explained. Flight data recorders have been used in airline accident analysis, but with the increased use of electronics in general aviation airplanes, flight data recorder quality information is often available. Examples of each of the new technologies will be presented and discussed, including CT scanners, Lidar, laser scanning of accident scenes, 3-D printing, the use of UAVs and virtual reality, and others.
Below is our FINAL program!
