floating platform
TECHNICAL COMPLEXITY
flexibility lightness complexity
Technical challenges in addition to weight reduction are part of our process. The floating platform is an example of a pure wound system utilizing 74 pins to be wound around. This complex structure has many different sensors, battery packs, thrusters and fuel cells. This custom build was specifically requested from the customer to meet a sever weight reduction.
As normal sandwich plate construction was too heavy due to the inserts and pins. Gradel explored making a sandwich structure that utilized integrated hybrid joints to connect the various parts and also serve as the substructure of the platform. This in turn allows the researchers to change configurations in several ways while reducing the weight of the final structure.
