How to Build 2: Learning Zone How to Build...

It's a big night.

We've been looking forward to this for a long, long time.

It's like going to the hospital

to see your baby finally being born

and brought out into the daylight.

I've ordered three, obviously.

This is the point that we've all been working for, for the past four or five years.

So, very, very excited. Difficult to put it into words.

McLaren is one of the world's leading Formula One companies,

employing famous drivers like Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button.

But the company's now building its first mass-produced sports car.

Called the MP4-12C.

It's a tough market, but the company's hoping their clever design

and innovative engineering will give it the edge over its competitors.

It's taken five years of intense development to get here,

and the process began as a series of concept sketches.

We're the guys that sit on the airplane, we don't watch movies, we sketch.

Or, you know, we're sitting in a restaurant,

we're sketching on the napkin, we sketch on our hands.

Designers, I think that's just

a normal thing is just to sketch, sketch, sketch.

Car designers like Frank use all sorts of inspiration.

I, personally, keep some of my favourite animals in the studio.

Sharks. There's a horse.

Love that. I love shapes.

This is one of my favourite shapes.

I get a lot of inspiration from looking at sculptures such as that.

I'm never bored.

Just walking down the street, you can find so many things,

not just the shops, you can find things on the sidewalk,

the type of tiles, the paintings on signs.

There's always something to inspire you.

I love that guy.

You think we're kids because we're allowed to have

these toys in front of us.

That's the nature of any designer.

You'll find they have a toy shop around them.

The Fokker Dr1. This is my favourite plane.

And Frank's inspiration doesn't stop with his toys.

If you look at the animal kingdom,

you'll see a lot of animals that are built for speed.

You can really relate to all the energy being coiled over the rear wheels,

especially because that's the driving part of our car, in the back.

As an animal, a cheetah or whatever, they're driving off the rear legs most of the time.

That's an element that we're starting to find,

starting to bring in to the design.

Animals that have gone through hundreds of thousands of years of evolution are still around,

still look extremely beautiful.

Nobody says that a cheetah doesn't look beautiful.

It's an optimised design of what works.

While Computer Aided Design, or CAD for short,

helped conceptualise design,

the next stage is to create something physical.

Now I'm taking you into the design studio.

It's probably the most restricted area

in the McLaren Technology Centre.

Very rare that people come in here, even within McLaren itself.

So, what I'll show you is what we actually do in here.

And what you're going to see is the clay model.

And, contrary to popular belief, it's actually done by people who built it by hand.

So, mostly they're trained sculptors who are very, very efficient

at creating a physical object from a sketch.

And they're masters at what they do.

McLaren are incredibly secretive

when it comes to showing off their clay designs

because they are constantly experimenting

with the finer shapes and contours for their cars.

To actually be here looking at the car like this is unheard of.

We don't let anybody in.

For us it's a joy to come in and see the baby sort of being developed.

This is almost as if it's in the womb of the mother.

The advantage of clay,

it's been around for the whole history of car design,

is because you can actually put it on the model.

And if you put too much on, you can take it off.

If you need more, you can put it on.

It's almost a labour of love. You have to get very close to the model

and feel how the transition from a hard radius

goes to a softer radius.

We can't do that on a computer screen.

It's almost as if you can design the car blind.

You don't have to see it, you have to feel it.

And by feeling it, you feel if it's right or not right.

There are no rules to where inspiration can come from.

Whether it's the natural world

or what designers see around them in everyday life.

That's when you know you've got it right,

when everybody looks at it and says, "I wish I could have something like that."

Every one of the team is devoted to this aircraft,

and making sure that it is the best aircraft.

As this wing unfolds, you'll see how big it is.

You'll see what a massive task it is to take it out.

You're actually standing there, and you've got 29 tonne in the air.

The Airbus A380 is the world's largest airliner.

The plane would even be a tight fit inside Wembley Stadium.

The wings are over ten metres wider than a football pitch,

and contain nearly a million individual components.

Each set of wings begins life as a collection of raw materials.

These panels, which will form the outer layer of the wing,

are made from aluminium,

because it's resistant to corrosion,

has a high strength to weight ratio, and is very light.

The aluminium is loaded onto Europe's largest milling machine,

which cuts and shapes the metal sheets.

The A380's wings can lift 560 tonnes of superjumbo

to an altitude of 12,000 metres.

This is down to their shape,

which is created when the carved panels get sucked

onto a specially moulded bed, and heat-treated

in the largest oven in the country.

This helps to fix the aerodynamic shape into place.

These panels form the outer skin of the wing.

And in another area of the factory,

the skeleton that forms the inside of the wing is also being prepared.

A production line like this needs to operate constantly,

so there are always different stages of the build

being worked on at the same time.

But, ultimately, all the different components will need to go into

the main assembly jig,

a massive construction frame, important because it allows

precise alignment and production,

with identical outcomes each time.

First in are the rear spars.

Three long sections that form the spine of the wing.

These spars are fixed firmly in place to 45 locating pins,

and will bear the whole weight of the wing

that will rise up lengthways in the jig.

Over the next five days, the team loads 49 ribs

that run across the wing, which add strength and flexibility.

These ribs are made from aluminium and carbon fibre composites.

Materials both known for their strength and lightness.

Finally, the frame of the wing is fully assembled,

and the skeleton is ready to be covered with the huge aluminium panels that form its skin.

Giant automated machines drill holes in the panels,

around 250,000 per wing set,

before they are lifted into position.

After 25 days, the main body of the wing is complete.

It weighs nearly 30 tonnes,

and is four storeys high lying on its side.

Complex builds like the Airbus A380 wing

rely on people working together,

with each team skilled at working on a sub-assembly,

which is a smaller part of the larger build,

and every part of the construction

relies on this meticulous attention to detail and process.

It must be right first time.

You can't service it, you can't bring it back.

You can't complain to the manufacturer that it doesn't work.

Failure in space is not an option.

Space is incredibly special. What we do is quite exceptional, here.

Temperatures in space can fluctuate

between a very cold minus 200 degrees centigrade,

to a blistering 150 degrees centigrade.

And one of the biggest challenges in satellite design

is keeping the temperature inside it fairly constant.

This is very important, because it's full of delicate

and complex electronics

that would stop working if they got either too hot or too cold.

So, how do designers and engineers tackle this and solve the problem?

The secret lies in the use of special materials.

My name's Katy Smith,

I'm the thermal architect here,

and I've been working here for just about six years.

My job is thermal design.

The build, the test of the spacecraft.

Deep space environment is incredibly hostile.

It's incredibly cold, minus 270 degrees C,

whereas the sun-pointing surface,

which could be in the region of 150, if not more.

And including on that,

you're in a vacuum, so there's no convective environment.

You can't reject heat, like you would, for example,

your cup of tea when you blow on it, removes the heat. Doesn't exist.

The satellite needs to be able to operate

within these massive temperature differences.

If we send spacecraft up into space with no insulation, it wouldn't work.

You'd have one side with severe damage to the structure

because of the sun's influence,

you'd have possible panels dropping off.

So the distortions caused by the very temperature differences

would buckle the structure and destroy it.

And the heat isn't just a problem on the outside of the satellite.

Because these extremes of temperature

could be disastrous for all the on-board electronics inside.

They can only operate between a cold minus 10 degrees

to a warm 40 degrees.

So, to keep the internal temperature within this range,

the satellite is wrapped in material called Kapton,

which is also found in computers and solar panels.

Kapton is the high-temperature layer. It's very robust.

You can use it in an environment from minus 250 degrees C

up to a continuous operating temperature of about 290 degrees C.

I think the best way of describing it to a home product

would be a Quality Street wrapper.

It's difficult to tear, incredibly light.

So, for a space environment, it's hugely applicable.

But Kapton can't protect the satellite on its own.

What you're actually seeing here is a very thin deposition of aluminium.

So, here, when you can see the gold outer layer, it's not actually gold.

What you're seeing is

the vacuum-deposit aluminium behind the Kapton, like that.

Giving it an amber or gold effect.

The aluminium-backed Kapton forms a blanket, insulating the satellite

and preventing heat being lost to deep space.

While, at the same time,

helping to stop the sun overheating the electronics inside.

I know it seems kind of counter-intuitive,

because you've got large amounts of energy coming in from the sun,

but to balance it out and find a happy medium,

you have to block some of the sun, dump some of the heat,

and supply some heat internally.

It's a really complicated juggling act.

The Kapton blanket is the first line of defence at keeping the satellite

at a reasonably constant temperature.

But the electronics inside also create their own heat.

And this also needs to be dissipated.

To do this, some very clever engineering

is incorporated into panels

that form part of the satellite's structure.

These panels are covered with a complex matrix of pipes,

and these pipes act as massive radiators,

dumping heat generated by the electronics,

and keeping the internal temperature constant.

A heat pipe is a very effective method

of moving heat from one local region to another.

There's no working parts, no electricity required,

so power-wise, it's good.

But unlike household radiators, these pipes contain ammonia,

because it boils and vaporises at just the right temperature,

33 degrees centigrade.

So what happens is, at one end,

in the hot, high power dissipation region,

what will be a liquid at that stage evaporates.

The vapour then travels up the centre of the tube

to the cold region, and at this region it condenses.

It dumps the heat and then travels back down to start the whole cycle again

in the form of a liquid.

Satellites allow us to send television pictures

and communicate over vast distances,

using all the modern technology the world has to offer.

But they wouldn't be able to operate

if it wasn't for clever engineering and the use of special materials.

ENGINE REVVING

See ya!

McLaren, one of the world's leading Formula One companies,

has been building racing cars for nearly 50 years.

They are now entering the competitive world

of commercial road cars

with their first ever mass-produced supercar, the MP4-12C.

The company is hoping special materials that they use on their Formula One cars

will give them the edge in the mass-produced car market.

Chief mechanic Neil Trundle knows the importance

of specialist technology.

This is MP4/1,

the first carbon chassis Formula One car ever made.

This is an old friend of the family.

The new road car has its genesis in this Formula One car,

the first to use a lightweight material in the chassis,

borrowed from the aerospace industry - carbon fibre.

Because of this

inherently weak area here,

the aluminium chassis were twisting.

When we did the carbon chassis,

we realised we achieved 100% stiffer chassis than had been made before.

So, suddenly our car was the leading technology.

Some of the other teams said that it was a fragile material,

that it would shatter,

but all the accidents we've had in it

proved that it was up to the job.

And since then, carbon chassis have got stronger and stronger

and safer and safer. But this was the start of it.

Not only was the company's carbon chassis stronger and safer,

but it was a lot lighter.

Which meant acceleration and handling were greatly improved.

And by applying these features to the new road car,

it too is lighter, so faster, and stronger, so safer,

improving its fitness for purpose.

All the new road cars start life like this.

A carbon fibre tub.

This is the very fist component

that goes to making the car.

Without the tub, the interior doesn't have anywhere to fit,

you can't put the crash structure on,

can't put the engine in, can't put the body panels on.

Everything about this tub is maximised

to combine as many functions as possible

and through a single component.

The tub is made away from prying eyes, in a factory in Austria.

What I have here is a biax material,

which means that on one side you have fibres running that way,

and on the other side you have fibres running that way.

And that's held together by the stitching that you can see here.

Now, by layering this up in different ways,

by using the triax material and the biax material,

we can orientate the strength in the direction we want it,

without adding additional weight.

Pieces of carbon fibre are layered until they form the correct shape.

This is the part of the process

that I'm really excited about.

It's where we combine

the carbon fibre pre-forms with the resin

that will hold the whole lot together and form the carbon monocell.

So we have three different areas of this system.

We have the pre-form loading section, which you can see behind me.

We have the transfer system

which will then take the tool from this area into the press.

We then have the resin injection system,

and that is where all of the clever bits are done.

This machine is where a secret process

injects a resin into the mould, under intense pressure.

Unfortunately, I can't go into too many details

because it is top secret,

it's the sensitive area of the tub

where we really don't want everyone to understand

exactly how we make what is, effectively, the recipe for the tub.

This secret system is completely unique to McLaren,

and means a new tub can now be produced about every four hours.

With this process, we've reduced

the number of man hours it takes to build the chassis

from 4,000 on the F1 road car down to four hours on the MP4-12C.

Makes me really proud.

The secret process has brought the production cost down by 90%.

Specialist technology like carbon fibre

is increasingly being transferred to commercial use,

with companies hoping

it will give them the edge over their competitors.

The thrust when this vehicle takes off

is the equivalent of about 12 A380 Airbuses taking off.

This is a pretty rough ride for the satellite,

and that's what all the design and everything is about.

This is the bit where we all get

that little bit of butterflies in the stomach.

Telecommunications satellites orbit the earth,

allowing us to send television pictures

and communicate over vast distances.

They have to be able to operate in the harsh environment of deep space

for a minimum of 15 years without fail.

This requires some advanced engineering.

However, the biggest challenge and most critical point

is the extreme violence of the rocket launch.

A satellite is built up of thousands of electronic components.

Every single one has to undergo a series of tests

to ensure they won't fail, and stop the satellite from working.

Astrium's engineers lead the world

in satellite design and manufacturing.

Today, a frequency generator,

which helps the satellite communicate with earth,

is going through the launch test.

My name's Gary Stancombe.

I've worked in vibration test and mechanical test at Astrium

for 15 years now.

I'm just going to do a little bit of taping down to tidy it up,

and then we'll be ready. OK.

This test is to check that the component

will survive the extreme physical impact of the satellite's launch.

What we're going to do today is subject this unit

to a sequence of vibration tests to simulate the launch environment

when the rocket lifts off,

and those eight minutes which will take it into space.

It does get a fair old shake,

so today we're going to subject it to

a 20 G vibration test.

20 times gravity.

So anything in there will feel 20 times heavier.

Every electronic component is tested in this way,

sometimes to breaking point.

These are hard tests, yeah.

It's a thorough test.

It has to be.

We have to ensure that everything

is going to still be working once the unit gets into space.

We do see failures, but not too often.

But it's not just the vibration of the launch that each component has to cope with.

There are also massive shock waves.

These happen as explosive charges de-couple each stage of the rocket,

from the solid boosters,

the satellite housing and main engine,

through to the deployment of the satellite itself.

These are quite substantial shock waves,

so they need to be tested for.

OK. And that's the shock test.

Thanks to tests like this,

the spacecraft can now survive the launch,

and start its life in space.

35,786 km above us,

satellites constantly operate,

transmitting signals down to earth,

making sure you can watch TV, go online and use your mobile phone.

I absolutely love the profile of that wing.

Absolutely stunning.

It's lovely, really lovely. And you feel really proud when you see that.

It's an old saying, but there's no hard shoulder at 35,000 feet.

The Airbus A380 is the world's largest airliner.

The wings that carry this superjumbo

need to be able to take enormous loads and stress,

flight after flight, and still be safe and reliable.

That's why constant testing for fitness for purpose is crucial.

As chief engineer responsible for the ongoing development of the wing,

John Roberts is on his way to the German city of Dresden,

to visit one of his most important test sites.

I mean, I've got probably the best job in the factory.

It's a great job, looking after this aeroplane.

And they pay me for it as well, which is good.

The Dresden rig is a test structure so large

it took two years to build.

You always get a buzz and an excitement

seeing the sheer scale of this test facility that we do here.

If you don't get any excitement out of things like this,

you're in the wrong business.

And here we are. Welcome to IABG in Dresden.

What John's engineers are after is proof that the superjumbo

and its wings are strong enough to last a lifetime of flight.

To find out, they've spent well over £100 million

on the largest test rig of its kind ever built.

Achtung, der Versuch wird gestartet.

The rig is essentially a giant torture machine

to expose any weaknesses

in the design of the plane's structure that might develop,

by simulating the kind of stresses

a real plane would experience in flight, over and over again.

The most interesting part of this test

is the bit which takes all the punishment.

The aircraft, when it's flying,

all its loading is being taken up on the wing,

which you can see up there.

So all the punishment is being driven into the wing structure,

and this is a demonstration of what it looks like

while it's actually in flight.

A computer system drives a network of 180 hydraulic rams

that bend and distort the wings.

It bends, doesn't it?

You can never fail to be impressed on seeing something like that.

Computer modelling of real journeys means that,

in this simulation,

flight times can be reduced

to only the bits of the journey

where the plane is particularly stressed,

like turbulence and landing.

This would be a window which an ordinary passenger

might be looking out along the wing.

In the test here, the end of the wing

is moving up by over four metres during normal flight cycles,

and down, when it's on the ground, by nearly two metres.

People always look out along the wing and see it bouncing up and down in turbulence,

and thinking "Is this something that I should worry about?"

Well, we test it with the assumption it happens all the time.

No, you don't need to worry about it.

And precise engineering ensures the wings bend in exactly the right way.

The ability of the wing to take huge punishment

is down to the design of its structure.

It needs to be light, but also very strong.

Inside, this structure is like a skeleton,

with ribs and spars, which provide stability and support,

and also withstand external forces.

The ribs and spars are made from aluminium and carbon fibre composites,

materials known for the flexibility, lightness and strength.

And this test is the pinnacle of a whole testing programme,

to prove the plane is safe to fly.

In terms of proving the aircraft is safe,

you have to put together a portfolio which shows everything

from the individual little valve that sits within the wing

through to the complete structure test.

We always joke that when the paperwork is heavier than the aeroplane,

you're about close to getting it right.

Tests like this are being carried out all the time,

to help engineers make great designs come to life.

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