Patent ID: 11964410
Assignee: THE BOEING COMPANY
Field: Other special machines (Mechanical engineering)
Classification: CPC B | IPC B

Claim 12:
13. A method for fabricating a composite part, the method comprising the steps of:
placing a base composite layer into a cavity of a tooling surface;
inserting a mandrel into the cavity of the tooling surface such that the base composite layer is between the mandrel and the tooling surface;
applying a skin to the mandrel and the base composite layer so that a package, comprising the mandrel, the base composite layer, and the skin, is formed;
enclosing the package in a vacuum bag and curing the base composite layer and the skin; and
removing the mandrel from the cavity of the tooling surface following the step of curing the base composite layer and the skin,
wherein:
the mandrel comprises elastomeric components, aligned end to end and contacting each other to form a segmented mandrel body,
each of the elastomeric components comprises a first surface and a second surface,
the first surface comprises a protrusion and a depression,
the protrusion of the first surface abuts the second surface of an adjacent one of the elastomeric components, and
the depression in the first surface provides a volume, into which the adjacent one of the elastomeric components expands axially due to thermal expansion.