Patent ID: 7824171

Claim:
An expandable compaction tool for consolidating a composite element having at least one enclosed cross section, comprising: at least one pair of corner segments configured to compress a composite material into internal corner regions of a mold as the tool expands; and a curved wall segment configured to compress the composite material against an interior wall of the mold as the tool expands, the wall segment being concave to the interior wall of the mold along a substantially entire length thereof between the corner segments when the tool is unexpanded, the wall segment conforming to the interior wall of the mold when the tool is expanded, the tool being configured such that as the tool expands, the wall segment is disposed in non-contacting relation to the composite material such that the corner segments compress the composite material into the internal corner regions of the mold before the wall segment contacts and begins to compress the composite material; and a faceted enclosed chamber defined by a plurality of the corner segments and a plurality of the wall segments.