Alliant Techsystems received a five-year, $22 million contract from the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) to develop automated-composite technologies designed to reduce the manufacturing costs and increase the performance of large, composite launch vehicle structures.

The Large Automated Production of Expendable Launch Structures (LAPELS) program contains 17 specific initiatives, including: low-cost tooling, filament winding techniques, integrated health monitoring, thermal protection systems and tape lamination.

Work will be performed at the ATK facilities in Clearfield, Utah and Iuka, Miss.