In this image an F16 is undergoing a composite hot bonder repair on the the lower wing skin fuel vent hole. To account for the efficient heat sinking of this structure a large heater blanket is also controlled by the same hot bonder on the topside of the wing for the purpose of containing the heat ('heat dam') loss from the repair zone.

In these images you can see how the Zimac heater cells surround the repair area allowing access to the patch. Before the composite repair was laid in place, silane and epoxy primer coatings were cured without heat lamps or other types of heating devices.  A ramp rate of five degrees Fahrenheit per minute was used. The heater cells were purposely placed back far enough from the patch to accommodate the tacky tape for the bagging material, the vacuum fitting for the vacuum bag as well as the fitting for the calibrated vacuum gage.

This arrangement permits the repair engineer/technician to perform the three operations in one set-up for all of the curing processes resulting in significant timesaving.

Zimac Projection Heating is an efficient method to heat substrates that possess good thermal conductivity characteristics such as aluminum aircraft structure as well as thermally insulating structures such as graphite epoxy. In the metallic case the heat is conducted to the adhesive and composite patch and thusly cured from the metallic side.

In the instance of an insulating structure, the hot bonder cells are placed on a tile/caul plate and inject heat through the patch from the 'top'.