Firms thrive in aerospace industry

There's a certain attraction that draws companies to the aerospace industry.

It's a field that is difficult to break into and requires a good deal of engineering expertise to remain ahead of the pack. But once a firm gets through the front door, the perception is the sky's the limit. Of course, that's not necessarily the case.

Companies that produce elastomeric products learn quickly there's a lot of tough, highly qualified competition to contend with in the field and, like in many sectors, the ground rules can change—sometimes slowly, more often quickly.

For instance, Lord Corp.'s Scott Miller, global marketing manager for the Cary, N.C.-based company, said “the industry has gone through some fairly big changes in the last 10 years.” Although the commercial aircraft business has continued to experience strong growth, he noted, other segments have been up and down.

He said the defense market dropped sharply and then became relatively flat after reaching high levels three years ago. “And the commercial helicopter market is suffering a major slowdown currently, due to the reduction in offshore oil and gas operations.”

Trelleborg Sealing Solutions' Michel Prouff, head of the company's worldwide aerospace operation, noted that some of the biggest changes in the industry for seals include the introduction of new concepts to reduce emissions and noise for engines with higher temperatures. That requires greater performance from seals, he said.

He said the aerospace industry is copying the automotive industry in terms of seeking more parts from their suppliers that are built to specifications.

A 50-year veteran of the industry, Prouff noted that all major development programs in the industry are in their final stages, “and challenges for Boeing, Airbus and Bombardier are to be sure they can make money with these planes for the next 20 years. Price pressures on Tier 1, 2 and 3 (suppliers) will become very high while, at the same time, lots of suppliers need to invest to cope with aggressive volume ramp-up.”

These aspects put the aerospace supply chain at risk for the next several years, he said, “and it is obvious we will continue to see a lot of mergers and acquisitions between suppliers to the aerospace industry.”

Breaking into the market can be difficult or quite easy. It varies widely by segment, Miller said.

"In some segments of the industry,” he said, “technical capability and innovation are important. In others, the industry may be starting to look more like the auto industry, where price, quality and delivery reliability are the most important things to customers.”

Having experience and success in the automotive sector helped to open doors for Q Holding Co., doing business as Quality Synthetic Rubber or QSR, in the aerospace segment, according to Randy Ross, president of the Twinsburg, Ohio-headquartered company.

A recent entry into the sector, the company also has exceptional technical capabilities, he said. He said the firm's wealth of knowledge and expertise in producing connector seals and other components for the automotive market made it an ideal fit for aerospace. It also had customers in the field that it regularly serves, which made it easier to enter the market.

Ross said aerospace is growing partially because of the Asian boom. There also has been a push to make more carbon efficient, lighter aircraft and older parts are being upgraded, he said.

“You don't get into the aerospace business and expect success overnight,” he said. “It takes years to develop the business. We only do $2 million to $3 million in business in (aerospace) sales at this point. We'll build on that.”

All three firms are experiencing various levels of success in the aerospace industry because of their product expertise. They discussed the industry and the roles they play along with some advantages and pitfalls in separate interviews recently.

Lord Corp.

Lord has witnessed many of the changes and has learned to deal with the peaks and valleys in the industry since the latter part of the 1920s when the firm provided instrument vibration mounts for Charles Lindbergh's historic transatlantic flights, according to Miller.

Currently, levels of uncertainty are very high, but the expectation is that the aerospace market will grow pretty much in line with the world gross domestic product in the next decade, he said.

He said commercial air transport “has grown very strongly for more than a decade on the back of strong passenger mile growth in emerging markets and low interest rates, which make it less expensive to buy new equipment.”

Lord traditionally has provided vibration isolation products and helicopter rotor bearings and dampers to companies in the aerospace industry. More recently, it has been producing electromechanical and sensing products such as its Active Vibration Control Systems and Inertial Measurements Units to control helicopter vibration and to enable antenna pointing applications.

The industry has demanding requirements for size, weight, reliability, performance and cost, Miller said. “It is a good fit for the Lord value proposition.”

Lord recently completed the acquisition of Fly-by-Wire Systems France to enhance its position in the global aerospace industry.

Quality Synthetic Rubber

Seal maker QSR has been in business and very successful for 50 years, Ross noted. During that span, “we've dealt with rigorous requirements, so it's in our DNA. We've proved that we fit with the aerospace market very well.”

A global manufacturer that focuses on electrical management and lifescience, it is vertically integrated with its Quadra Tooling & Automation unit.

That has allowed the company to add pilot control input devices and electromechanical actuators to its product portfolio, Miller said.

Lord serves virtually all parts of the aerospace sector, including space, helicopters, commercial airliners, business aircraft, unmanned aircraft, ground vehicles and other weapons systems.

Aerospace is roughly one third of the firm's business, Miller said, and it has been a very important part of the company's business for more than nine decades.

QSR wasn't fazed by downturns in markets when it entered the aerospace business. Ross views the field as a great place to expand. The company focuses on electrical management in the aerospace segment, he said, because it was a natural jump for the firm, in part because of its strong foundation in the medical and automotive fields along with its expertise in electrical management.

It entered the field by producing electrical seals for longtime customers it services in other markets, primarily automotive, who also are involved with the aerospace market. The firm built a solid foundation, and the business is growing slowly, Ross said.

He admitted the company's initial beachhead has been Twinsburg, “but we fully intend to be a global company in aerospace and establish manufacturing operations in Asia and Europe, along with the U.S. Customers want a supplier for all their markets, not several suppliers.”

It currently has seven manufacturing facilities spread across the U.S., Europe and China with another in Mexico coming online in the latter part of 2016.

QSR's existing customers were comfortable working with the firm, he said. “But we needed certification to deal directly with Boeing, Airbus and others... although we have not taken the next step to supply them directly as yet.”

In April, the company received AS91000 Aerospace Certification, an aerospace standard that supplements ISO9001 quality system requirements to satisfy Department of Defense, NASA and Federal Aviation Authority quality requirements.

In addition, it added a dedicated aerospace room housing specialized equipment at its Twinsburg plant in anticipation of new business. “We have made significant investments in materials development and FEA (finite element analysis) capabilities,” Ross said.

Those moves, “along with extensive engineering expertise, allows us to offer best-in-class assistance to customers looking for a partner to work closely with them throughout the production process,” he said.

He maintained that by taking the company's long-term global expertise “at developing sealing solutions for connector companies in the automotive and industrial markets and applying it to aerospace connector companies,” QSR can be as successful in the industry as it is in automotive and medical.

“Our roots go back into the automotive and off-the-road industries for electrical seals,” he said. “We make the same types of products for aerospace.”

Trelleborg Sealing Solutions

Seal and bearings maker Trelleborg Sealing Solutions, a Stockholm-based Trelleborg A.B. business, has seen its share of aerospace industry fluctuations in the last few years but, like Lord, it has made adjustments and moved on.

Based in Fort Wayne, Ind., in the U.S., the company has been serving the sector globally for about 60 years, and during that span seals have become much more important in the industry, according to Prouff.

“We worked on the Spitfire in World War II,” he said. The Spitfire, a British fighter plane, which gained fame in the Battle of Britain in 1940 and 1941, served in every theater of the war.

Trelleborg Aerospace was more fragmented globally during a portion of that 60-year period, Prouff said, “and only well known under many names by parties in the industry.” That was before Trelleborg brought it all together under the Trelleborg Aerospace moniker.

It has been well recognized in the aerospace field for at least the last 15 years, the executive said.

"We are a market leader in seals and bearings for aircraft hydraulics,” he said. “We offer a wide range of seals and other polymer products for aircraft engines as well as a full range of airframe seals.”

Prouff said Trelleborg was on the cutting edge with aerodynamic seals. And because there's a need for more fire seals, he said, the company is working on products to fill the need. It also is interested in putting more intelligence in the seals it produces.

"Trelleborg considers aerospace a key sector among all its industrial activities,” he said, so it will continue to enlarge its aerospace product range via internal developments or through external acquisitions of specialized companies.

It also supplies fabric slides for aircraft from its plant in North Carolina, but the unit is not part of the firm's sealings operation. “That's a significant business,” Prouff said, and combined with the sealings business, gives the company a $200 million aerospace operation.

Trelleborg has more than $3 billion in sales worldwide annually. Trelleborg Sealing Solutions contributes about $1 billion to that figure with Trelleborg Aerospace accounting for about 15 percent of that. About 45 percent of the aerospace unit's business is in the U.S. and Europe.

It has been expanding its testing capabilities over the last several months, Prouff said. In July, Trelleborg Sealing Solutions added a new primary flight control test bench, used primarily to test seals, at its recently expanded test center at the firm's Fort Wayne plant.

Located within the facility's HA Traub Technical Center, the test equipment, housed in an addition that spans 1,000 square feet, offers a multimillion cycle testing capacity, considerably shortening the proving time of flight control applications, the firm said.

It said the test bench will support designers in the evolution of pistons and rod seal designs or entire packages before hardware is available.

Trelleborg's new product testing laboratory is part of Trelleborg Sealing Solutions' research and development center for the Americas, which provides materials testing, materials development, product engineering and product development for the firm's evolving sealing product line.

In August, the company added a fire test center for aerospace seals at its manufacturing plant located in Northborough, Mass. A state-of-the-art operation, it addresses aerospace manufacturers' needs to meet a variety of test requirements to comply with industry and customer standards for vibration and air flow, the company said. It primarily tests airframe and engine seals.