Shaping the future of composite fastening

bigHead's philosophy is that fastening well means thinking holistically. Fasteners are never an 'add-on' - they're integral to successful design, manufacture and assembly. Getting that right is complex.

This is why the company contributes its expertise to academic research as well as cutting-edge commercial projects. By sharing knowledge, the company supports innovation in the field. And it's a two-way street, because through these partnerships bigHead explores new ways to evolve its products.

Composite materials expertise

Nestled in the rolling green Bedfordshire fields is Cranfield Innovation Centre, home of bigHead's composite fastening innovation team. It's right next door to Cranfield University, where bighead has close and long-standing links with the Enhanced Composites and Structures Centre.

Cranfield has established graduate programmes on applied research into composite materials and their manufacturing processes. Over the years, bighead has supported a range of MSc projects here, including:

- Adhesive bondline thickness control and its role in stress redistribution

- Evaluating anti-corrosion treatments on carbon fibre composites

- Exploring the adhesive compatibility of different anti-corrosion treatments

- Fastening technologies for automotive composites - resulting in a fastening selection framework the company still uses today

The practical experience gained through these projects continues to inform bigHead's guidance on corrosion mitigation strategies for embedded fasteners, and on adhesive selection.

What's more, three former Cranfield students have joined bigHead, including Dr Lawrence Cook and Oli Le Marquand-Brown, bringing valuable research and experience into the company's innovation team.

A recent Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTP), funded by Innovate UK, also gave bigHead the opportunity to expand its expertise. Three MSc student projects explored embedding and material flow in sheet moulding compound (SMC), including investment in lab-scale tooling.

Through bigHead's involvement, the company created a capability for developing and demonstrating resin ingress sealing and shut-off strategies - allowing bigHead to make its fasteners more integration-ready than ever.

Global fastening insights with RWTH Aachen

At Germany's Institut fur Textiltechnik (ITA), part of RWTH Aachen University, researchers have been exploring the integration of bigHead fasteners into tailored fibre placement (TFP) preforms. The process has huge potential for high-quality constructions to be realised economically and reliably at the same time.

bigHead supported the project with fasteners, technical input, and a visit to the team for a detailed exchange of ideas. That kind of hands-on involvement means bigHead can take research learnings and feed them straight into its product refinement.

Supporting tomorrow's engineers

bigHead is also a keen supporter of Formula Student teams around the world. Over the last few years bigHead has provided fastening samples and technical guidance to teams in India, the Netherlands, Sweden and the UK.

Formula Student tasks teams to design, build and race a single-seater race car, usually as part of a degree-level project. It's seen by the motorsport industry as the standard for engineering graduates to meet, transitioning them from university to the workplace.

The student teams face unique design and assembly challenges, often working with composite materials in fast-paced, resource-limited environments. bigHead's fasteners give them flexibility: enabling secure, repeatable connections without the need for heavy tools or large investments in specialist machinery.

The Shell Eco-marathon, for example, challenges students to build ultra-efficient prototype vehicles with game-changing energy efficiency results. In 2022, Team ETA from India built an incredible battery-electric prototype vehicle, with a carbon fibre monocoque body. bigHead composite panel fasteners helped them hit ambitious weight targets while maintaining structural integrity.

This year, bigHead is supporting Team KTH, whose new car, Brinell DeV19, is competing at Formula Student events in Germany and Austria. Speaking about bigHead fasteners, they said: "We use these versatile fasteners as nuts and bolts in combination with carbon fibre composites and metals. Whether laminated into parts or bonded later, they enable strong, reliable connections that are essential to our car's performance."