George Patterson wrote:
Matt Whiting wrote:

You don't need glass to make a slick airframe.


No, but the slickest ones use compound curves, which are much more
easily made using composites.

Only if you are talking making them by hand or with low volume
production equipment. If hydroforming or stretch forming equipment is
used, compound curves in metal are much faster to make than in composite
materials. It is hard to be essentially a pressing/stamping process for
speed, once you make the capital investment required to do this.
Detroit makes all sorts of compound curves in metal at costs much less
than for composites. Ask GM which is cheaper to produce, the metal body
for a large sedan or the fiberglass body of the Vette.


Matt