Advances Wales feature Spectrum NovaJet in latest edition

17 Jun 2010

A real live wire in inkjet technology

A South Wales manufacturer is using ultraviolet and inkjet technology to mark wires for identification purposes in aircraft.

An aircraft contains hundreds of miles of electrical wires, which need to be easily identifiable at any point to facilitate the initial production of the wiring harness, as it is known, and its subsequent maintenance. Colour coding is impractical because of the large number of wires, so each wire is given a unique alphanumeric code, which is marked at regular intervals down its length. Previously, this marking was done by the hot stamp method – a glorified typewriter approach in which embossed characters are used to transfer ink from a foil on to the wire by stamping it under pressure into the surface of the wire insulation.

However, over time the thickness of wire insulation has been reduced to minimise the weight of the wire. This means that the insulation is now only 150 μm thick, about three times the diameter of a human hair, and is now too thin to safely accept hot stamp marking without the risk of the hot stamp penetrating the insulation and leaving it prone to a subsequent failure. In the worst case this may take the form of a catastrophic arc tracking event, in which the insulation explodes in a ball of flame and destroys the wire system and puts the aircraft in danger.

Spectrum Technologies, based in Bridgend, South Wales, is a global leader in aerospace wire processing technology. The company pioneered the development and introduction of ultraviolet (UV) laser wire marking technology to meet the needs of the international aerospace industry. The process developed by Spectrum is used in the CAPRIS® wire markers that the company sells to aircraft manufacturers to apply permanent identity codes to non-stick polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE, more commonly known as Teflon®) and similar wire insulations, as well as fibre optics, without causing damage.

Advances Wales, Issue 64, Summer 2010, pp.22-23

To read the full article and see how Spectrum worked with Sikorsky to develop the NovaJet, click here to download the PDF.

For more information on NovaJet high speed inkjet wire processing systems, please click here.