Dear Colleagues, 

The design of aerospace vehicles requires that all structures and repairs to load bearing structural elements be designed in accordance with damage tolerance design principles, which are largely based on the discipline of fracture mechanics, and which for military aircraft are detailed in the Joint Services Structural Guidelines JSSG2006 and in the USAF Damage Tolerant Design Handbook. This design philosophy has evolved as a result of a number of high-profile (military and civil aircraft) incidents, viz: The 1954 Comet failures, the 1958 B-47 accidents, the 1969 F-111 accident, the 1978 Dan Air 707 Lusaka accident, and the 1988 Aloha 737 accident.

While the problem of ageing aircraft was initially associated with metallic airframes, it is now recognized that composite and bonded structures are also at risk. Here the primary challenges are associated with the disbonding of bonded structures, and the effect of delamination and impact damage on composite airframes. The problem is accentuated in that most composite and bonded airframes are designed to a “no growth” philosophy. Hence, any growth means that the certification basis of the aircraft may be compromised.

In this context the US Under Secretary, Acquisition and Sustainment has recently enunciated that the DoD will use AM to “enable the transformation of maintenance operations and supply chains, increase logistics resiliency, and improve self-sustainment and readiness for DoD forces”. He further stated that: “AM parts or AM repair processes can be used in both critical and non-critical applications”. 

As a result this Special Issue will address topics associated with:

• Ageing metallic aircraft
• The effect of corrosion on aircraft structural integrity
• Composite and bonded airframes
• AM replacement parts, and AM repairs (cold spray, laser additive metal deposition, etc.)
• Bonded repairs to ageing aircraft

Prof. Dr. Rhys Jones AC
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Aerospace is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• ageing aircraft
• disbonding
• delamination growth
• additively manufactured parts
• cold spray repairs