Engineering assessment of the OceanGate Titan failure
I own a carbon fiber design &amp; manufacturing shop that does aerospace and undersea work.  Watched the video by &quot;Just Alex&quot; and the section the bonding of the titanium end-caps and the cylinder absolutely gave me the creeps.<p>The video was absolutely right to mention lack of dust-free environment (vs open warehouse), lack of temperature control, and lack of degassing equipment. We also have no idea about the properties of the epoxy used to bond it, whether it has the suitable amount of compliance, properties under temperature change, etc.<p>Worse yet, I saw no precautions being taken to avoid entrapped air in the bond, in fact, it seemed quite likely, and the sections with entrapped bubbles would be NOT bonded.  Same for any sections with entrapped dust, debris, or whatever else was floating around that warehouse.  I would want to see, along with the all of the above steps, either or both applying very substantial pressure to the Ti&#x2F;Carbon parts while curing to force out any air, and&#x2F;or doing the whole process in a vaccum environment.<p>The out-of-date carbon fiber?  Sure, it is fine, for some months, for noncritical applications.  For critical applications?  NO WAY.  And the CEO&#x27;s claim that aerospace needs to be more stringent than undersea 5000psi is just beyond stupid.  You need absolutely the best bond between layers that you can get.<p>Also, the 480-odd layer layup and cure is hugely experimental by itself, and I&#x27;ve read elsewhere that the shop was given six weeks to design and fabricate the hull.  Insane.  I&#x27;d feel like six weeks to design and run a few initial proof-of-concept tests of a 5-inch thick layup would be too quick.<p>I could keep going for pages just on the carbon-fiber crimes I&#x27;ve read about.<p>My absolute disgust for the CEO grows every time I read more.  He got what he deserved, but the passengers he suckered into taking the trip did not.