3-D composite materials are highly sought after for many industrial applications. Current 3-D materials, such as pre-impregnated substrates and ‘fuzzy’ textiles, offer limited performance improvements, especially in thin-sheet structures. In particular, the creation of composite materials with substantially improved out-of-plane performance has...

Currently, fastening a bolt requires using either a classical wrench for small bolts or a hydraulic stretcher for heavy duty bolts such as those employed in large manufacturing applications (e.g. oil exploration/production). These existing methods are generally labor intensive and therefore expensive and time consuming. In addition, due to weight...