Simulation and optimization of a slurry-based fiberglass preform manufacturing process

Conference · Fri Dec 01 04:00:00 EST 1995

OSTI ID:135148

Johnson, R W; Landon, M D

As a part of the Partnership for a New Generation of Vehicles (PNGV) program directed by the U.S. Department of Commerce, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) is currently supporting various research and development projects identified by representatives of the U.S. Council for Automotive Research (USCAR) as high priority areas deserving special attention. A water-based slurry process for producing chopped fiberglass preforms that can be used in manufacturing structural automotive composites is being developed by researchers at the Idaho National Engineering Laboratory (INEL) and members of the Automotive Composites Consortium (ACC), as part of the U.S. Advanced Manufacturing Partnership (USAMP). The main objective of the project is to achieve a uniform (by mass) distribution of fibers in the preform. To this end, computer modeling and experimental efforts are currently underway at the INEL. The present article reports strategy, progress and current results for the modeling effort. The modeling effort includes computational fluid dynamic simulations of the current process to help visualize process dynamics and computer-based design optimization that automatically adjusts process parameters to find the best design to meet the objective.

• Research Organization: EG and G Idaho, Inc., Idaho Falls, ID (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE, Washington, DC (United States)
• DOE Contract Number: AC07-94ID13223
• OSTI ID: 135148
• Report Number(s): INEL--95/00246; CONF-9511141--1; ON: DE96002536
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATION
33 ADVANCED PROPULSION SYSTEMS
DESIGN
ECONOMICS
ENGINEERING
FIBERGLASS
FINITE ELEMENT METHOD
MANUFACTURING
PERMEABILITY
SCREENS
SLURRIES
VEHICLES