Overview

Saint-Gobain, Aerospace Flight Structures Operation, located in Ravenna, Ohio, with corporate offices located in Wayne, New Jersey, is a wholly owned subsidiary of Saint-Gobain Performance Plastics Corporation (SGPPL), incorporated in California, with annual sales of $1 Billion worldwide. SGPPL is wholly owned by Companie de Saint-Gobain of Paris, France, with annual sales over $30 Billion. The Flight Structures plant in Ravenna is a self-contained Business consisting of Design, Engineering, Quality Assurance, Manufacturing and Customer Service with internal linking by various support organizations. The Company serves a broad, worldwide spectrum of the aviation industry, including commercial and regional airlines, aircargo carriers, as well as original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) of commercial, regional, business and military aircraft and aircraft Flight Structures.

The company's diversification, coupled with ever broadening product offerings, allows it to respond to the changing needs of its customers and the marketplace. Saint-Gobain Flight Structures is ideally and uniquely positioned as one of the few companies worldwide that cn offer a total solution of products, services and systems to the largest aerospace and airline companies in the industry.

EXPERIENCE

Saint-Gobain has specialized in the design development and manufacture of high performance, high quality radomes for over 45 years, 35 years at the current location. We have fabricated large special mission radomes ranging in size from more than 18 feet long, 6 feet wide, 4 feet deep, and 250 lbs., down to a small hemisphere the size of a finger thimble weighing only 1/3 of an ounce. Saint-Gobain takes great pride in its knowledge and expertise in the complex art of electromagnetic window design and development and in the ability to manufacture a high quality product that complies with the customer’s specification and FAA regulatory requirements.

Saint-Gobain is one of the world's leading suppliers of radomes for virtually hundreds of different aircraft and air vehicles. These radome applications vary from private and light aircraft installations to large commercial aircraft. Saint-Gobain manufactures many radomes as an Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM). In addition, Saint-Gobain also currently manufactures nose radomes of its design for air transport, commuter, corporate, and general aviation aircraft. All of these radomes have received a Supplemental Type Certificate (STC) or Design Approval and Parts Manufacturing Approval (PMA) from the Federal Aviation Administration. We have obtained over 300 such radomes approved to date.

Saint-Gobain has worked on many special mission radomes. These special mission radomes are generally used with advanced radar systems for surveillance, hyper-spectral scanning, synthetic vision, live television, and satellite communication. By participating in these programs, Saint-Gobain has developed the analytical, engineering and production expertise required to design and build radomes with superior electromagnetic transmission capabilities.

Saint-Gobain has extensive experience in maintenance of radomes comes from repairing up to 1,000+ radomes per year over the last decade. These radomes are from all segments of the commercial and military markets, from almost all operators and manufacturers, both domestic and international. This quantity of repair and the types of damage observed provides an important experience database in understanding the reliability and maintainability of radomes from all different manufacturers. This service history provides feedback to design and manufacturing. This feedback determines the boundaries of the design concepts that provide acceptable performance, reliability and maintainability, and cost effectiveness.

MANUFACTURING FACILITY

Saint-Gobain Performance Plastics Corporation has a U.S.-based manufacturing location for the production of radomes & composite structures. Our original site is located in Ravenna, Ohio, east of Akron, Ohio. The facility covers 75,000 SF of main building, production, and tool storage area.

Lamination Clean Room

An environmentally controlled Clean room is used for the lamination of composite materials. This controlled area assures that optimum conditions exist for the handling, use and storage of prepreg laminates and materials used in the manufacture of radomes. The radomes are vacuum bagged in the Clean room and moved to the ovens that are centrally located to control contamination, minimize tooling mold movement and enhance operator efficiency.

Large Curing Capacity

Large capacity, electronically controlled ovens are in operation for curing most of the standard radome product line. Molds are rotated through the ovens and cured on a daily basis. Cure cycles are temperature controlled to ensure proper heat rate and dwell times are used to get maximum efficiency and uniformity of the cured radome. The ovens can operate to a maximum temperature of 600°F.

Sheet Metal Department

Saint-Gobain maintains a broad range of metal forming equipment and tooling in their sheet metal department for forming and installing metalwork into radomes. Typical metalwork includes attachment frames, latches, clips, antenna mounts, lightning diverters, and other special metalwork. Heat-treating and surface treatment facilities are located nearby for treating metalwork as required. Saint-Gobain has also qualified hydro forming subcontractors readily available for forming large or high volume parts.

Paint Department

Radomes are painted in spray booths located in the facility, all are fully equipped with temperature and positive air pressure controls to assure a proper environment for painting radomes. The plant has just installed a new air compressor with air drying capability to provide optimum compressed air for the painting process. Saint-Gobain's painters are experienced in the application of all radome paint systems, including epoxy primers, anti-static coatings, polyurethane topcoat finishes, and erosion resistant finishes.

Machining & Tooling Capability

Saint-Gobain has in-house shops for the manufacture of machined parts and composite tooling. In addition, there are numerous shops in the immediate area that provide widely varying degrees of sophistication for machining and tooling manufacture. This industrial base is indicative of the steel, automotive, and rubber industries prevalent to the area that continues to utilize local resources for tool development.

Electromagnetic Testing

Saint-Gobain maintains a fully equipped radio frequency indoor anechoic chamber test range for testing radomes of all sizes and shapes. The electromagnetic test equipment is Hewlett Packard (HP) electronic equipment; this is kept accurate and calibrated per MIL-STD-45662 under annual contract with HP. The capabilities of the test range include:

• Fully absorbed anechoic chamber in an enclosed room to assure accurate radar signal measurement.
• Automated Test Equipment to assure repeatable and accurate radome tests.
• Full test range capability, including tests for: transmission, reflection, beam deflection, main lobe beam width, and side lobe level (to –40 dB).
• Continuous azimuth scanning during electromagnetic testing of radomes. Elevation Tilts up to ±30° for any size of nose radome and Azimuth Scans up to ±90° provided there is antenna clearance; selectable data increments of 0.05° (0.50° typical).
• Color Test Reports plotted on a HP plotter for permanent test records.
• Full Compliance to RTCA DO-213 MOPS and ARTC-4 electromagnetic testing requirements.
• Special adaptive equipment to test special mission radomes.

Saint-Gobain has been testing radomes for 35 years and has performed radome electromagnetic testing on a broad range of radomes. The test range is staffed by experienced technicians who are thoroughly knowledgeable in radar and radome electromagnetic testing. The test range can be configured to test radomes of all sizes and shapes, including Airbus widebody (A300, A310, A330, A340), Boeing 747 and Lockheed C-130 size radomes and large belly mount radomes. The test range is also used at the Saint-Gobain FAA Approved Repair Station to evaluate damaged or poor performing radomes. Repaired radomes can be fully tested before and after repair to assure that the radome meets the required radar transmission performance.

 QUALITY ASSURANCE

Saint-Gobain’s Quality System is registered with ISO-9001 and AS-9100. Additionally, the Quality Assurance System at Saint-Gobain is based on guidelines established under MIL-I-45208, MIL-STD-45662, Federal Aviation Regulations (FAR's) and other customer quality requirements.

The QA system oversees the manufacture, repair, overhaul or alteration of products at the operation to ensure that the delivered product meets the customer requirements as defined in drawings, specifications and other data. The QA System is continuously surveyed by representatives from the FAA, CASE, Government (DCAS), and many other Customers in the composites and aviation field. Saint-Gobain's Quality Procedures Manual has been approved by many Government agencies and Customers, and is available for review at any time by Saint-Gobain's Customers. Saint-Gobain's Quality Assurance system works independently of all other departments to audit and verify that all products and services comply with Customer requirements.

ENGINEERING

The Ravenna Engineering department has a staff of technical experts that develop, certify, and oversee the manufacture of radomes and composite structures, and assemblies. Each has at least 15 years experience in the aerospace industry. All but one has been in Ravenna for at least 10 years. While each person has a particular specialty (radome design, Finite Element Analysis, lightning protection, tooling, CATIA, certification, FAA regulations) all work freely with each other, and with the customer to achieve the end goal of a product development that meets performance requirements in a timely manner and on budget.