Composite Bonding Autoclave Wireless Channel Measurements

Autoclaves are essential for composite bonding of high-performance materials in the automotive and aerospace industries. The composite bonding autoclave process includes material lay-up, vacuum bagging, curing, temperature and pressure ramp-up, holding, cooling, pressure release and unbagging, post-curing and machining, followed by inspection and quality control. To monitor and control the curing process, thermocouples are placed throughout the autoclave to measure internal temperatures. Accurate reporting of each thermocouple's location is required. A wireless portable device can facilitate this reporting process. To enable a reliable wireless network, channel measurements were collected between points inside the autoclave and proposed access point (AP) locations outside. These measurements characterize the wireless channel conditions for the intended network setup.