Characterization of continuous carbon fibre reinforced 3D printed polymer composites with varying fibre volume fractions

Khalid Saeed,Alistair Mcilhagger,Eileen Harkin-Jones,Cormac Mcgarrigle,Dorian Dixon,Muhammad Ali Shar,Alison Mcmillan,Edward Archer

doi:10.1016/j.compstruct.2021.115033

Khalid Saeed, Alistair Mcilhagger + Show 6 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compstruct.2021.115033

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Abstract

Fused deposition modelling (FDM) is one of the most popular additive manufacturing (AM) technique which is used to investigate the elastic properties of 3D printed polyamide-based polymer composites structures. The aim of this work is to study the mechanical properties of continuous carbon fibre reinforced polyamide polymer composite samples using tensile and flexural testing by varying the fibre volume contents with applying pressure, temperature and holding the samples for 60 minutes in the platen press. The results showed that the strength and stiffness increased with the increase in fibre volume content (fraction). Hot pressed samples exhibited the increase in tensile strength by about 27 % and elastic modulus by 11 % because of increasing the fibre volume fraction from 29 % to 35%. Synergetic effect of both short and continuous carbon fibre was also studied, and it was observed that the tensile properties were higher for the samples reinforced with short and continuous fibre than only continuous fibre polymer composites. Effects of voids on 3D printed continuous carbon fibre-reinforced polymer composites were quantified. A microstructure study of the 3D printed polymer composites was carried out using scanning electron microscope (SEM). Following SEM analysis on the tested specimens, it was observed that there was a strong correlation between the mechanical properties and the microstructure. Fibre volume fraction was measured using acid digestion method to determine the amount of fibre contents before and after hot pressing (compaction). From Micro- Computed Tomography (µCT) it was confirmed that hot pressing reduced the void content which in return increased the strength and modulus.

Highlights

additive manufacturing (AM) technology is expanding day by day in many industries because of manufacturing geometries with minimum production cost and time
Fibre volume fraction was increased using hot platen pressed machine by applying pressure at 130 ◦C to investigate the mechanical properties by improving the interface bonding between fibre and matrix and reducing the voids that were induced during printing
The main goal of this work was to study the effect of varying the carbon fibre contents in 3D printed specimens with polyamide-based composites, along with the application of pressure on 3D printed parts using platen press at a constant temperature for 1 hour

Summary

Introduction

AM technology is expanding day by day in many industries because of manufacturing geometries with minimum production cost and time. One of the major concerns (limitation) of the FDM is the lower me chanical properties of 3D printed polymer materials which include. Nylon along with continuous carbon fibre is used to fabricate polymer composite. Strength and stiffness can be increased by adding reinforcement which can be either short and/or continuous fibre providing bridging effect to achieve desire mechanical properties. Faisal et al [7] studied the effect of material formulation on mechanical performance and bioactive potential of PEEK and hydroxy apatite composites. It was found that in terms of mechanical perfor mance no significant difference was noticed, it showed better bioactive performance in comparison to pure PEEK. Yong et al [6] studied the synergetic effect of both short carbon fibre (SCF) and continuous carbon fibre reinforcement on the mechanical properties for 3D printed polymer composites using FDM technique.

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