Contact
Biography
Tom has been a part of the Composites Research Group since 2000 when he graduated with an MEng in Mechanical Engineering. He gained his PhD in Crashworthiness of composite materials in 2005 and remained in the group as a researcher. He became a member of the academic staff in 2015 to teach on the Aerospace undergraduate programme.
He is active in both the Polymer Composites group and the Centre for Aerospace Manufacturing. He has a wide range of interests in composites manufacturing & assembly, process automation, composites design and analysis, discontinuous fibre composites process design & modelling and carbon fibre recycling & fibre reuse, he has approaching 60 papers in these areas. He recent years he has been a key member of the composites recycling team where he has been active in the development of a large fluidised bed recycling plant and several lab scale processes for fibre alignment and recycled fibre quality control. He has also been active in the development of business cases for several novel processes and has worked closely with a number of industrial partners in the aerospace and automotive sectors. He has supervised 17 PhD students to completion and is the winner of the 2006 Institute of Materials, Minerals & Mining Robotham Medal. Chartered Engineer and Member of the IMechE
Teaching Summary
I lead the first and second year Aerospace Programme modules in Engineering Design - MMME1049 Aerospace Design & Materials and MMME2033 Aerospace Design & Manufacture. I also run the… read more
Research Summary
I am deputy Director of the EPSRC-sponsored CIMCOMP Future Manufacturing Hub in Composites, a £10.3m investment into composites manufacturing in the UK. As part of this work i lead the Strategic… read more
I lead the first and second year Aerospace Programme modules in Engineering Design - MMME1049 Aerospace Design & Materials and MMME2033 Aerospace Design & Manufacture. I also run the integrating Project component of MMME1050 which is a project to develop a small powered aircraft. As part of my role i am responsible for our 3D CAE software package which is used throughout the course.
Current Research
I am deputy Director of the EPSRC-sponsored CIMCOMP Future Manufacturing Hub in Composites, a £10.3m investment into composites manufacturing in the UK. As part of this work i lead the Strategic Development Committee to develop new funding opportunities and i run a Hub core project on Automated Dry Fibre Placement.
I am also active in the area of composites recycling and the reuse of carbon fibres from recycling processes. i develop processes and methods to transform recycled fibres into materials that can be reintroduced into the composites supply chain with greater mechanical properties than those available from current materials.
I have a general interest in composites manufacturing automation - using the increasing power of computational tools to improve the rate and quality of composites, to increase the level of automation by replacing hand labour and understanding the capabilities of manufacturing equipment and how to rationalise that with the requirements of composite components.
Past Research
My PhD is in crashworthiness of composite structures - how to increase energy absorption from composite laminates and understand the effect of material and manufacturing choices on the performance of the component.
Future Research
I welcome enquiries from potential PhD candidates from Home, EU and International countries who are interested in the following research areas: Aerospace design for manufacture, Automation of composite manufacturing processes & Carbon fibre composite materials recycling and reuse.