Abstract
Carbon fiber recycling has garnered significant attention in recent years due to the large volume of manufacturing waste and upcoming end-of-life products that will enter the waste stream as the current generation of aircraft is retired from service. Recycled carbon fibers have been shown to retain most of their virgin mechanical properties, but their length is generally reduced such that continuous fiber laminates cannot be remade. As such, these fibers are typically used in low-performance applications including injection molding, extrusion/compression molding, and 3D printing that further degrade the fiber length and resulting composite properties. However, recent advances in the processing of long discontinuous fiber textiles have led to medium- to high-performance composites using recycled carbon fibers. This review paper describes the recent advances in recycled carbon fiber textile processing that have made these improvements possible. The techniques used to manufacture high-value polymer composites reinforced with discontinuous recycled carbon fiber are described. The resulting mechanical and multifunctional properties are also discussed to illustrate the advantages of these new textile-based recycled fiber composites over the prior art.
Highlights
The limitations are: (1) fabric uniformity is highly dependent on fiber opening prior to web forming; (2) air flow irregularity adjacent to the walls of the conduit leads to variability across web structure; and (3) fiber entanglement in the airstream can lead to web faults
While the high alignment offered by recycled carbon fiber yarn-based composites lends itself to enhanced mechanical properties, the inherent out-of-plane fiber orientation due to twisting leads to some reduction in mechanical properties
Significant progress has been made in developing high-performance recycled carbon fiber textiles for automotive grade composites in recent years
Summary
Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. The automotive industry is rapidly becoming one of the largest consumers of carbon fiber, accounting for 10% of the global demand in 2018 with a compound annual growth rate of 6% expected until 2025 [1] Much of this demand is driven by lightweighting efforts, which result in a 6% to 8% improvement in fuel economy for every 10% of weight reduced [2]. 2018, this translates to between 14 kilotons and 42 kilotons of waste carbon fiber annually, which is significantly more than the entire automotive industry demand of 14.3 kilotons in 2018 [1] This steady manufacturing waste stream is primarily driven by the aerospace and wind industries, who are the greatest consumers of virgin carbon fibers. Conclusions are drawn that put the state of the art into perspective and identify areas of research needed to further develop recycled carbon fiber composites
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
