Patent ID: 8216641

Claim:
A method of fabricating a composite material part having carbon fiber reinforcement densified by a matrix, the method comprising the steps of: making a coherent fiber preform of carbon fibers, the making of the fiber preform, including superposing fiber plies and bonding the fiber plies together by needling progressively as they are superposed one on another using first needles having a first working section; forming holes in the fiber preform by simultaneous penetration of the preform by a plurality of non-rotary second barbed needles that are substantially mutually parallel and are distinct from the first needles, the simultaneous penetration of the second barbed needles being achieved by moving a support carrying the second barbed needles, the second barbed needles having a working cross-section larger than the working cross-section of the first needles to form within the carbon fiber preform holes extending from at least a first face of the carbon fiber preform and having a cross-section of a mean dimension lying in the range of 50 μm to 500 μm; and densifying the preform by a chemical vapor infiltration type process to deposit therein a material constituting the matrix.