Defense Cables and Assemblies for Air & Land

The Defense sector depends on critical avionics, vectronics and tactical equipment to deliver real-time Intel and constant communication for mission-critical success, safety and survivability. Undoubtedly, cables and assemblies connected to these sophisticated electronics represent a lifeline to personnel. Whether you’re a pilot flying an F-16 fighter jet or UH-60 Blackhawk, a soldier geared up for ground combat or maintenance crew, cables and assemblies must function reliably at all times.

But, cable materials can get easily damaged from complex routing, which causes abrasion, cut-through and even breakage. Other stress factors like extreme temperatures, tough weather and terrain, severe vibration, high impact and harsh chemicals can cause cable materials to deteriorate over time. These challenges can risk missions and personnel safety, plus result in cost-intensive cable replacements, maintenance, repair, labor and downtime.

It all starts with cable material durability, flexibility and reliability, and this is where Gore’s expertise can make a difference.

Our commitment to innovation is based on decades of carefully understanding materials and how they interact with real-world conditions. We have unique and unparalleled expertise in manipulating expanded PTFE (ePTFE) and other fluoropolymers. Our engineers can change a material’s structure, shape, thickness and surface geometry, then pair it with complementary materials to provide the performance qualities required by the application and customers. The result is our ability to make reliable solutions that have been flight-proven and field-tested over the years.

Despite their environments, our products have been proven now and over time in resisting shock, UV rays, liquids and gases, flames, wide temperatures and other volatile conditions. They're also proven to provide superior EMI/RF shielding effectiveness among multiple electronic components over competitors. For even more durability, our flexible conduits for fiber optic and copper cables provide some of the highest levels of protection and abrasion resistance available in the industry.

Standard cable materials with more durability tend to be thick and heavy, but each extra pound or kilogram of weight can increase operating costs. Fortunately, we can manipulate our materials to make them thinner, smaller and lighter without compromising durability or signal integrity and transmission. Some of our products are up to 60% lighter than competitors, saving valuable weight and space in aircraft, vehicles and carry-on equipment. And unlike standard materials that are stiff and difficult to handle, our lightweight materials are highly flexible for faster, trouble-free routing and use.

Supporting the latest standardized protocols and advanced open-source architectures, our fiber optic and copper cables meet high bandwidth and high-speed requirements for data transfer on modern vectronics and airborne digital networks. These reliable cables — Ethernet, HDMI and USB, to name a few — deliver secure signals and transmit instant data and video in applications like radar/radio systems, glass displays, soldier systems, portable devices and more.

Other products include tethered drone cables for ISR (intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance) to help support critical decision-making and MIL-STD-1760 assemblies that have delivered 100% successful store releases on many defense aircraft platforms. For future aircraft and vehicle electrification, our wire bundles deliver power supply at higher voltages with long-term durability and stability.

With higher frequencies and 5G capabilities on the rise, our RF assemblies deliver quality signals from 18 GHz to extremely high frequencies up to 110 GHz. Rugged and flexible, they maintain low loss, reliable VSWR and consistent phase and amplitude stability for improved system performance and test outcomes.

Our RF coax assemblies perform reliably in many defense aircraft and vehicle applications, like SATCOM antennas, active electronically scanned array (AESA) radars and C4ISR/C5ISR suites. They're also known to perform reliability in various defense test applications, like vector network analyzers (VNA), portable analyzers and 5G test systems.

We rigorously test and pre-qualify our wires and cables to meet the most stringent industry standards. Many of our mil-spec cables and wires are compliant with MIL-T-81490, SAE AS4373™ and VG95218-31 standards.

There’s no margin of error during air-to-air combat or on the battlefield. Since 1958, Gore has been a long-trusted partner to the armed forces and the original equipment manufacturers who support them. They rely on our life-protecting solutions for mission-critical success, survivability and safety. We’re proud that our products have won industry awards and are used in many aviation and ground defense applications, including every major aircraft, like the latest fifth-generation F-35 fighter jet.

Whatever the mission, Gore provides standard and custom cable solutions to meet your exact defense application requirements and future needs. Armed forces can feel confident that they’ll receive clear communication and real-time Intel for better situational awareness of what’s happening in the air or on land.