On Tuesday 7th April GKN Aerospace is holding a groundbreaking ceremony at the site for its new composite production facility near Filton, UK, where A350 XWB spars will be manufactured using HexPly® prepreg from Hexcel. Hexcel will be mounting a small display with product samples at the event.

In 2008 Hexcel was awarded the biggest contract in its 61 year history to supply primary structure prepreg for the Airbus A350 XWB. Since the announcement Hexcel has continued to forge an ever stronger partnership with customer GKN Aerospace who is responsible for the development and supply of the A350 XWB spar and fixed trailing edge assemblies.

As part of the contract Hexcel will supply GKN with HexPly® carbon fibre/epoxy prepreg in the form of unidirectional tape. The HexPly® prepreg is in an optimised form for Automated Fibre Placement Processing, an innovative composite production technique that will be used to manufacture the A350 XWB spars, reducing labour time and minimising production costs.