By Kalwinder KaurMay 17 2012
Advanced Photonix, recently declared that it has achieved a contract from Concurrent Technologies (CTC) to deliver a terahertz (THz) system for the U.S. Air Force, in response to their demand for precision coating removal on aircraft.
This $300K -valued contract focuses on delivering the company’s new T-Gauge system and a sensor designed for application in the Company’s Q2 of this fiscal year.
The Air Force contracted CTC, an applied scientific R&D services organization to develop a robot mounted laser ablation scanner that can take out partial or entire paint layers from an aircraft’s surface. Removing the paint from the aircraft and its parts is a complicated task for the Air Force. Precise thickness measurement is required for those various layers. The API T-Gauge system, paired with a high-speed line scanner serves as a major tool for the laser removal process. The API THz system is capable of scanning the surface as well as creating a 3-D map that ensures efficient robotic motion control and precision movement of laser for better paint removal.
Advanced Photonix has an excellent history of several contract achievements for measuring the thickness of thin coatings on aircraft panels, on the fully constructed plane and in the paint booth. Following a brief feasibility study, CTC has slightly modified contract, wherein a high speed scanning system has been incorporated to ensure precision measurement of the pre-ablation coating. The commercially available T-Gauge system enabled CTC to complete their contract more rapidly. Also, the initially forecasted development risk was considerably reduced.
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