Case Study: Beacon Power accelerates carbon composite flywheel research with MecSoft VisualMILL

Beacon Power - Customer Case Study

The customer, Beacon Power, faced the challenge of a time-intensive, week-long manufacturing process for curing the carbon composite cores of its energy-storing flywheels using outdated technology. For its research into solving this, MAS Automation Systems, funded by the DOE, utilized VisualMILL from vendor MecSoft Corporation to generate toolpaths for manufacturing crucial components of a new curing system.

MecSoft Corporation’s VisualMILL was used by MAS to program and machine parts, including a specialized spool and slurry assembly, for a new curing process that uses a 4-million-electron-volt beam. This solution enabled the research to successfully cure a flywheel sample in just 45 minutes—a dramatic reduction from the 12 hours required by the conventional method—demonstrating the potential to revolutionize the manufacturing of this smart-grid technology.

Beacon Power

Mark Sherwin

MAS Automation Systems