Abstract
Compaction behavior of textiles has a major influence on the outcome of various manufacturing processes for fiber reinforced polymer composites. Nevertheless, no standard exists up to date which specifies test methods or test rigs. A recent international benchmark revealed high variation associated with the result data. This work is a very first step toward a reference specimen, allowing for an isolated view on variations attributed to the test rig mechanics. A specimen design is proposed, intended to show compaction characteristics similar to technical textiles in terms of transverse compaction pressure and corresponding displacement. The reference specimen was tested in a round-robin study comprising test rigs at four different European research institutions. While reproducibility of the compaction behavior on each of the test rigs was high, clear variations between the results gained with different test rigs were observed.
Highlights
Compaction response of fiber structures is of interest when it comes to designing manufacturing processes for fiber reinforced polymer composites
This is especially true for Liquid Composite Molding processes, such as vacuum infusion, where manually, machine or fluid pressure induced compaction takes place during preforming and impregnation
All rigs are based on a universal testing machines (UTM) (IVW – Zwick 1485, MUL – UTS EuroTest 250, NCC – Zwick 1478, UoN – Instron 5969), where the sample is compacted between two plates, capturing (a) the force required to move these plates by means of load cells and (b) the relative position of the plates
Summary
Compaction response of fiber structures is of interest when it comes to designing manufacturing processes for fiber reinforced polymer composites. KEYWORDS Liquid composite molding; compaction; textiles; fiber structures; testing A single reference specimen (Figure 1) was manufactured, which was subsequently tested at four different research institutions. Two test series were performed on the same reference specimen, using each research institutions respective test rig.
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