Method and apparatus for making structural reinforcement preforms including energetic basting of webs of reinforcement material and energetic stitching of reinforcement members

Abstract From the Canadian patent

A rigid three-dimensional preform is made by moving a plurality of webs of fibrous reinforcement material superposed and coplanar to a cutter the webs, being coated with an electromagnetic energy-curable binder and pressed together. Prior to cutting a blank in a two-dimensional development of the threedimensional preform from the webs, the webs are tacked together at spaced local zones by locally curing the binder at those zones by locally applying the appropriate electromagnetic radiation (microwave ultraviolet, electron) so that the webs travel as one to the cutter. After cutting of the blank the blank, is loaded into a mold to replicate the threedimensional shape of the preform and the …