Thermoplastic Composites Parts Manufacturing Enabling High Volumes, Low Cost, Reduced Weight with Design Flexibility
- E.I. DuPont de Nemours and Company, Inc., Wilmington, DE (United States)
- Purdue Univ., West Lafayette, IN (United States). College of Engineering, Composites Manufacturing and Simulation Center
- Fibrtec Inc., Atlanta, TX (United States)
- DuPont Company, Wilmington, DE (United States). DuPont Performance Materials
In this project, a new carbon fiber composite manufacturing process has been demonstrated which has exhibited favorable fabric formability characteristics as compared to traditional woven materials. This new material combines Fibrtec’s flexible coated tow, FibrFlex®, with DuPont's Rapid Fabric Formation (RFF) technology and a proprietary DuPont polyamide resin, all supported by Purdue University’s extensive modeling and characterization capabilities. The coated tow material is a partially impregnated carbon fiber/polyamide composite tow where the carbon fiber is not fully wetted with the polyamide, yielding a more flexible tow material than one that is fully impregnated. The RFF process is an ultra-fast way of manufacturing fabrics with tows in varying orientations without the need to lift the tow during processing. Experiments, modeling, and simulations, all have shown that this process/materials combination is a potential method for producing lower cost continuous fiber reinforced polymer (CFRP) materials that conform well during molding with outstanding physical properties.
- Research Organization:
- Institute for Advanced Composites Manufacturing Innovation (IACMI), Knoxville, TN (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), Energy Efficiency Office. Advanced Manufacturing Office
- DOE Contract Number:
- EE0006926
- OSTI ID:
- 1434284
- Report Number(s):
- IACMI/-0001-2017/3.4
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
Similar Records
Impact of Technology Developments on Cost and Embodied Energy of Advanced Polymer Composite Components
Development of rCF Thermoplastic Non-woven Prepreg for Automotive Class A Body Panels via Compression Molding