Bruce Whitman has over 20 years’ experience in specialist fabrication, particularly for the aviation market. Along with the Technifab design team, Bruce was the creative leader responsible for the Boeing 787 window seal development, a new complex commercial aircraft window housing that serves as a mounting surface for an electronically-dimmable window pane. The utilization of foam for window seals was first introduced to Boeing for the 737 aircraft in order to save weight. ZOTEK® F was used to replace traditional silicone materials, resulting in weight savings of over 50%. Bruce designed both the seal and the tooling to manufacture it – the combination was crucial in enabling this innovation to become so successful. The 787 window seal application has a highly engineered approach due to its multifaceted requirements, and is required to meet superior aesthetic standards in the aircraft cabin. To add to the challenge, when the cabin is dark there can be no ring of light entering around the seal. Bruce and his team resolved this by incorporating ZOTEK F30 Grey into the outer part of the seal to eliminate sunlight breaking though and affecting the customer experience, while remaining aesthetically pleasing. To put the success of the 787 window seal into perspective, in 2019 Boeing built 14 planes per month, with an average of 94 window seals on each aircraft, all using this sophisticated technology.