Automated in situ consolidation process for pre-impregnated carbon fibers: a cyber phisycal approach

Abstract

The concept known as the fourth industrial revolution (Industry 4.0) has developed a wide field of study, such as the Internet of Things (IoT), Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) and Information and Communication Technology (ICT), with the objective to achieve enhancing the processes performance of automated systems. This work focuses on the field of CPS for an in situ consolidation machine, which handles pre-impregnated, in this case unidirectional carbon fiber tapes with polyamide 6, in order to create composite laminates. The physical model involves an unwinding system that feeds the tape into a turning table through a pressing mechanism, which has a radiation heater before and refrigeration after the presser to guarantee the composite temperature. The objective is to model and simulate the heating process before, during and after the pressing mechanism to feed an optimization algorithm in order to calculate the optimal working parameters such as heaters power, heater positioning and process speed taking into account the temperatures of the tape, to avoid overheating and to improve process time. The results are processed, so that they can send and receive data constantly, to an optimization system to alter parameters, without making programing code changes and avoiding the need to stop the consolidation. The CPS can handle different classes of pre-impregnated composites, by learning during the consolidation process, in order to improve the overall result, without the need of fully or partially reprograming the code, which a main characteristic of CPS.