MMPDS-04 Handbook Released

The newest revision of the Metallic Materials Properties Development and Standardization (MMPDS) Handbook has just been released. The document is an accepted source for metallic material allowables for aircraft and aerospace vehicle structures for the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), the Department of Defense (DOD), and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). MMPDS is the replacement for MIL-HDBK-5.

Many aerospace companies that make both military and commercial products find the standardization of metallic materials design data that are compliant with certification agencies to be a substantial benefit. Design requirements for military and commercial products might be widely different, but often the required minimum design values for strength, durability, and damage tolerance of metallic materials are quite similar. MMPDS provides a reliable source for minimum design properties and typical physical properties, as well as fastened joint allowables.

MMPDS-04 was prepared by Battelle under contract with the FAA.  Richard Rice, Research Leader of the Mechanical Analysis Group for Battelle’s Equipment Development and Mechanical Systems Product Line, noted that “the design allowables that are presented in the handbook are commonly accepted by various certification agencies, so it saves money for both the material suppliers, who don’t have to generate additional test data to sell it to a user, and for the user, who doesn’t have to go through more data generation to justify the numbers that are proposed in a particular aircraft.” The benefit extends to the certifiers as well, Rice said, adding that the handbook “standardizes the procedures that various airframers have to follow in order to meet minimum design requirements for metallic materials used in their structures. They won’t have one set of rules for Boeing and another set of rules for Lockheed and another one for Airbus, so it offers more consistency for the certifying agencies as well.”

Rice points out Battelle’s longstanding responsibility for the document. The company “has for many years been the technical coordinator of the handbook,” he said. “Battelle took over the contract with the Air Force in 1954, and a couple of years after that, the document was formally titled MIL-HDBK-5.” With the Air Force in the lead, Battelle worked as the handbook’s coordinator for over 4 decades. Then, in the late 1990s, when the Air Force’s funding base for technical coordination of the Handbook diminished, the FAA took over the lead role. “That transition over a period of years led to the change from MIL-HDBK-5 to MMPDS in the early 2000s,” said Rice. As the handbook’s technical coordinator, Battelle prepares all of the agenda items that are presented at biyearly coordination meetings. Data obtained from tests conducted by producers, industry, and government is submitted to MMPDS for analysis and review. “It’s our responsibility,” said Rice, “to compile everything that’s approved into the updates to the handbook that are reviewed by the government before they’re published.”

The handbook guidelines “talk about how much data and what kind of data must be generated in order to develop different kinds of design properties,” Rice said, “and it tells you how to analyze those data to come up with the properties that can be proposed for inclusion in the handbook.” Comprising more than 300 pages, the MMPDS guidelines offer considerable detail, Rice says, and “some of it gets fairly involved in terms of complex statistical analysis procedures.” References for data and test methods are included at the end of each chapter of the handbook.

According to Rice, approximately ten percent of the document had substantial changes since the last publication. “This latest edition of MMPDS-04 incorporates new design allowables on a high-strength steel and includes a reevaluation of several aluminum and titanium legacy alloys, alloys that have been in the handbook for a long time for which we have collected additional new data and either verified the prior minimum design properties or have found the need to modify those design properties,” he said. Other changes to the handbook include updates to guideline procedures in Chapter 9 as well as extensive editorial changes.

MMPDS-04 is the sole current form of the handbook. It renders all prior versions and MIL-HDBK-5 obsolete. Printed and electronic copies of the handbook are now available.

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