Space

LES ANCIZES

Accompaniment that supports the future
Seeking vehicles that are ever lighter, designed for longer and cheaper flights, the space industry is ceaselessly confronted by ever more challenges that require the highest guarantees in terms of quality and performance.

In order to assist its clients, Aubert & Duval meet their strictest requirements in terms of grade composition, microstructural integrity, size tolerance and quality control. Grades created for satellites can withstand temperatures as low as -200°C.

Aubert & Duval is NADCAP certified.

Our offer

We manufacture hemispheric shells for the buffer tanks containing high-pressure gas. These tanks play an essential role in the launcher propulsion phase and in remote transport vehicles, and more. Once assembled, these two hemispheres also ensure the structure’s mechanical resistance, thus reducing its weight and launch costs.
Playing a role in the recent development of 3D printing, which in particular allows for reducing the weight of parts, Aubert & Duval offers a wide range of metal powders in aeronautic-quality superalloys produced by VIM-IGA and intended for additive manufacturing.

Critical parts specialist
Depending on our customers’ requirements, our products are created to last for 100 seconds under extreme conditions, or for over 25 years.

This optimum quality is the fruit of steel and superalloy production technologies that allow for high purity: VIM/VAR or VIM/ESR/VAR triple melting.

Extremely limited tolerances also allow for creating walls of much lighter materials, thus reducing the weight of tanks comprised of only 2 elements, as against 3 in the traditional process.

Equipment with unique technologies
Our 65,000 tonne stamping press is one of the two biggest in the world. It allows for stamping parts of 8 m (26 ft).

Another unique characteristic, our “flash” quenching equipment for the high-resistance titanium hemispheres lowers the transfer time between heating and quenching to just 6 seconds. Depending on our customers’ needs, we can thus obtain either a rupture resistance exceeding 1,100 MPa (160 Ksi), or a perfect compromise between fracture toughness and tensile strength.