This article describes the characteristics of thermoplastic composites and its material forms. It presents the steps and considerations in manufacturing the thermoplastic composites. The article describes the various techniques of manufacturing, such as consolidation, autoclave molding, diaphragm forming, compression molding, roll forming, bladder molding, liquid molding, filament winding, and pultrusion.

This article focuses on the design process, materials, and manufacturing techniques for one-off and low-volume production sailing craft. These include racing yachts of typically 10-20 m length for short coastal events, 20-25 m ocean racers, 24 m America's Cup racing craft, multihull racers of 35 m or more, and large luxury cruising craft. The article discusses the tooling, laminating practice, curing, mold removal, and quality control, for manufacturing hulls, decks, masts, and appendages using composites.

Resin transfer molding and structural reaction injection molding belong to a family, sometimes denoted as liquid composite molding. This article provides information on the characteristics and automotive and aerospace applications of liquid composite molding. It reviews techniques that use hard tooling and positive (superatmospheric) pressures to produce structures. The techniques include vacuum-assisted resin injection, vacuum infusion, resin-film infusion, and injection-compression molding. The article provides an overview of the materials that are commonly used together with some of processing characteristics that are important to processing speed and part quality. It concludes with a discussion on design guidelines for the liquid composite molding.

Voids in fiber-reinforced composite materials are areas that are absent of the composite components: matrix (resin) and fibers. Voids have many causes but generally can be categorized as voids due to volatiles or as voids that result from entrapped air. This article describes the analysis of various types of voids. It reviews techniques for analysis of voids at ply-drops, voids due to high fiber packing, and voids that occur in honeycomb core composites. The final section of the article discusses void documentation through the use of nondestructive inspection techniques and density/specific gravity measurement methods.

This article describes common design criteria and identifies the design considerations that have a significant effect on the end product. The design criteria include cost, size, mechanical properties, repeatability and precision of parts, damage tolerance and durability, and environmental constraints.

This article describes processes and equipment that are used to produce composite tubular parts. The processes include sheeting, pattern cutting, tube rolling, shrink tape debulking, and finishing. The article provides a discussion on materials that are most suitable for tube rolling: preimpregnated materials and unidirectional tapes. The article also discusses wrapping techniques of cylindrical and tapered tubes, such as convolute and spiral wrapping.

Environmental effects of ground and flight environments, including temperature extremes, damage by chemical fluids, moisture, and so forth, affect the durability of polymer-matrix composites. This article provides information on corrosion control methods in aircraft structures. It discusses the design considerations for sealants in joints. The article describes the common methods to seal aircraft structures: fay surface, fillet, butt joint, channel, brush, and form-in-place seals. It discusses the surface preparation and application method of primer and topcoat systems. Primer and paint application equipment as well as sealant application equipment are reviewed.

Manufacturing process selection is a critical step in plastic product design. The article provides an overview of the functional requirements that a part must fulfil before process selection is attempted. A brief discussion on the effects of individual thermoplastic and thermosetting processes on plastic parts and the material properties is presented. The article presents process effects on molecular orientation. It also illustrates the thinking that goes into the selection of processes for size, shape, and design factors. Finally, the article describes how various processes handle reinforcement.

Vacuum infusion is a resin injection technique derived from resin transfer molding. This article discusses the characteristics of the technique and its applications. It presents the theory and background of the technique and provides an illustration of how parts are made. The article provides information on the equipment and material used for vacuum infusion. It describes the mechanical properties of components and summarizes the influence of production on the properties. The article concludes with a discussion on design guidelines.

Composite bonded repair technology is based on the use of advanced composite repairs or reinforcements that are adhesively bonded to a damaged structure. This article discusses the key steps that are normally encountered in the design, certification, and application of an adhesively bonded repair. Some examples of successful repairs to military aircraft are also discussed.

Coating of cast irons is done to improve appearance and resistance to degradation due to corrosion, erosion, and wear. This article describes inorganic coating methods commonly applied to cast irons. The coating methods include plating, hot dip coating, conversion coating, diffusion coating, cladding, porcelain enameling, and thermal spray. Organic coatings have a wide variety of properties, but their primary use is for corrosion resistance combined with a pleasing colored appearance. The article discusses the various types of organic coatings applied to cast irons. Practically any degree of smoothness or roughness and requirement for color and gloss can be filled by organic coatings. The article describes abrasive blast cleaning, abrasive waterjet cleaning and finishing, vibratory finishing, barrel finishing, and shot peening for processing iron castings.

This article presents a comprehensive collection of the definition of terms related to metallurgy.

Additive manufacturing (AM), or three-dimensional (3D) printing, is a class of manufacturing processes that create the desired geometries of an object, or an assembly of objects, layer by layer or volumetrically. AM has been used extensively for manufacturing medical devices, due to its versatility to satisfy the specific needs of an intended medical field for the product/device. This article provides a comprehensive review of AM in medical devices by the medical specialty panels of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Code of Federal Regulations, Parts 862 to 892, including anesthesiology, ear and nose, general hospital, ophthalmic, plastic surgery, radiology, cardiovascular, orthopedic, dental, neurology, gynecology, obstetrics, physical medicine, urology, toxicology, and pathology. It is classified under these panels, and critical reviews and future outlooks are provided. The application of AM to fabricate medical devices in each panel is reviewed; lastly, a comparison is provided to reveal relevant gaps in each medical field.

This article is a compilation of definitions for terms related to engineering materials, including plastics, elastomers, polymer-matrix composites, adhesives and sealants, ceramics, ceramic-matrix composites, glasses, and carbon-carbon composites.

This article focuses on the three basic groups of flexible-die forming methods: rubber pad, fluid cell, and fluid forming. It provides information on the Guerin process, the Verson-Wheelon process, the trapped-rubber process, the Marform process, the Hydroform process, the SAAB process, and the Demarest process. The article provides a discussion on the procedures of these processes, as well as the presses and tools used. It describes the methods of hydraulic forming of thin metal parts, namely, hydraulic forming with diaphragm, hydraulic forming with gasket and pressure control, and hydrobuckling.

Bridging the gap between education and medical practice, centralized hospital-based 3D printing, or what is termed point-of-care (POC) manufacturing, has been rapidly growing in the United States as well as internationally. This article provides insights into the considerations and the current workflow of creating 3D-printed anatomical models at the POC. Case studies are introduced to show the complex range of anatomical models that can be produced while also exploring how patient care benefits. It describes the advanced form of communication in medicine. The advantages as well as pitfalls of using the patient-specific 3D-printed models at the POC are addressed, demonstrating the fundamental knowledge needed to create 3D-printed anatomical models through POC manufacturing.