A numerical analysis of an energy directing method through friction heating during the ultrasonic welding of thermoplastic composites

2019 ◽  
Vol 33 (11) ◽  
pp. 1569-1587 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shahan Tutunjian ◽  
Oguzhan Eroglu ◽  
Martin Dannemann ◽  
Niels Modler ◽  
Fabian Fischer

The ultrasonic spot welding of fiber-reinforced thermoplastic laminates received a wide interest from researchers mainly in the fields of aerospace and automotive industries. This study investigated a new technique for focusing the ultrasonic vibration energy at the desired spot between two mating thermoplastic composite laminates. In this investigated method, no additional energy directing protrusions between the mating laminates were required to focus the vibration energy. It was found that by welding the laminates amid an ultrasonic horn and an anvil in which the prior had a larger contact surface with the laminate as the latter, it was possible to generate a localized friction heating. In the initial phase of the welding, the friction heating softened the interfacial layers and thus caused the focusing of the majority of the cyclic ultrasonic strain energy in the weld spot center. The assumption for the presence of the friction and its influence on the heat generation was investigated by means of finite element method (FEM) mechanical dynamic analysis. Microscopic analysis of the weld spot eventually delivered the proof for the melt initiation by friction at a ring around the weld spot and subsequent spot growth by viscoelastic heating.

Author(s):  
S Boria ◽  
A Scattina ◽  
G Belingardi

In the last years, the spread of composite laminates into the engineering sectors was observed; the main reason lies in higher values of strength/weight and stiffness/weight ratios with respect to conventional materials. Firstly, the attention was focused on fibres reinforced with thermosetting matrix. Then, the necessity to move towards low density and recyclable solutions has implied the development of composites made with thermoplastic matrix. Even if the first application of thermoplastic composites can be found into no structural parts, the replacement of metallic structural parts with such material in areas potentially subjected to impact has become worthy of investigation. Depending on the field of application and on the design geometry, in fact, some components can be subjected to repeated impacts at localized sites either during fabrication, activities of routine maintenance or during service conditions. When composite material was adopted, even though the impact damage associated to the single impact event can be slight, the accumulation of the damage over time may seriously weaken the mechanical performance of the structure. In this overview, the capability of energy absorption of a new composite completely made of thermoplastic material was investigated. This material was able to combine two conflicting requirements: the recyclability and the lightweight. In particular, repeated impacts at low velocity, on self-reinforced laminates made of polypropylene (PP), were conducted by experimental drop dart tests. Repeated impacts up to the perforation or up to 40 times were performed. In the analysis, three different energy levels and three different values of the laminate thicknesses were considered in order to analyse the damage behaviour under various experimental configurations. A visual observation of the impacted specimens was done, in order to evaluate the damage progression. Moreover, the trend of the peak force interchanged between specimen and dart and the evolution of both the absorbed energy and of the bending stiffness with the impacts number were studied. The results pointed out that the maximum load and the stiffness of the specimens tended to grow increasing the number of the repeated impacts. Such trend is opposite compared to the previous results obtained by other researchers using thermosetting composites.


2016 ◽  
Vol 30 (12) ◽  
pp. 1693-1712 ◽  
Author(s):  
Suong Van Hoa ◽  
Minh Duc Hoang ◽  
Jeff Simpson

Automated fibre placement (AFP) is a relatively new process for the manufacturing of composite structures. Among many attractive features, it provides high-speed of material deposition, more repeatability in terms of quality of the part, less labour intensive (as compared with traditional methods of manufacturing such as Hand Lay-Up), less waste and the ability to transition more seamlessly from design to manufacturing. AFP can be used to process both thermoset composites and thermoplastic composites. Thermoplastic composites processing holds many potential benefits. This is because if the process is done right in producing parts with good quality, it is fast since it does not require a second process such as curing in an autoclave or oven. For the purpose of comparison of performance and for design, it is necessary to determine the mechanical properties of laminates made using this process. However, there are challenges in making flat coupons for the purpose of testing for mechanical properties. This article presents these challenges and the procedure developed to make flat laminates using a simple AFP machine. Mechanical properties of these laminates are also determined and compared with those obtained from laminates made using conventional autoclave moulding.


2019 ◽  
Vol 54 (14) ◽  
pp. 1831-1845 ◽  
Author(s):  
Abu Sadat Muhammad Sayem ◽  
Julfikar Haider ◽  
MM Alamgir Sayeed

The bast fibres, a subgroup of natural fibre family, have emerged as a strong competitor of widely used man-made glass fibre for use as fillers or reinforcing materials in certain types of composite materials, which do not require very high mechanical resistance. This paper investigates the manufacturing of multi-layered jute fabric-reinforced thermoplastic composite and its mechanical performance. Hessian jute fabrics in two, four and six layers without any pre-treatment were sandwiched in 0° orientation into seven layers of high-density polyethylene sheets and pressed at high temperature and pressure to form composite laminates having three different structural designs. The laminates with two, four and six layers contain approximately 6.70 wt%, 12.90 wt% and 18.50 wt% of jute fibres, respectively. Mechanical performance of the composite laminates having four and six layers of jute fabric was found to have improved significantly when compared to the pure high-density polyethylene laminates. Within a given sample thickness of 6.5 mm, the laminate with six layers of jute fabric exhibited the best mechanical performance. Optical microscopic analysis revealed that the yarn orientation of the fabrics within the composites remained stable, and there was no visible void in the laminate structure. Fracture morphology of the composite investigated by a scanning electron microscope showed good adhesion of the jute fabrics with the high-density polyethylene matrix.


2017 ◽  
Vol 51 (30) ◽  
pp. 4219-4230 ◽  
Author(s):  
Danning Zhang ◽  
Dirk Heider ◽  
John W Gillespie

In this study, void reduction mechanisms during oven vacuum bag processing of high-performance carbon fiber thermoplastic composites are investigated. Entrapped air exists within the prepreg tape and between layers during lay-up and must be removed during processing to achieve aerospace quality (<1% void content) Key void reduction mechanisms during oven vacuum bag processing include through-thickness air diffusion and in-plane flow to the laminate edges through the permeable interlayer regions created by the prepreg surface roughness. Interlayer permeability between unidirectional and cross-ply laminates is measured experimentally and is sufficiently high for effective air removal during oven vacuum bag processing. Thick 72-layer carbon fiber/PEEK (poly (ether ether ketone)) laminates were fabricated with oven vacuum bag process under different edge sealing conditions. Void reduction in the laminate with sealed perimeter is dominated by air diffusion through the entire laminate thickness, and the laminate exhibits very high void content levels after oven vacuum bag processing. In the laminates with edges open to vacuum, air diffusion through a single layer and flow through the permeable interlayer lead to essentially void-free laminates. The findings show the importance of the interlayer permeability and edge conditions on the void reduction, and demonstrate that low void content can be achieved in thick section thermoplastic composite laminates via cost effective oven vacuum bag processing.


2011 ◽  
Vol 284-286 ◽  
pp. 373-376 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jia Horng Lin ◽  
Ching Wen Lin ◽  
Jin Mao Chen ◽  
Ting Ting Li ◽  
Ting Wei Chang ◽  
...  

Thermoplastic composites are eco-friendly to environment. In this study, PET/PP thermoplastic composite laminates were produced by interleaving polypropylene (PP) sheets with polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plain fabrics in the condition of varying thermocompression temperature, pressure and time. Afterwards, peel resistance, tensile and impact properties of PET/PP thermoplastic laminates were tested. And the tensile and impact performance of PET/PP laminates was respectively about 40 % and 320 % higher than PP laminates. It was shown that when thermal compressing under pressure of 40 Kg/cm2 at 230 °C for 0.5 minute, PET/PP thermoplastic laminates had optimum tensile and impact properties.


1994 ◽  
Vol 3 (6) ◽  
pp. 096369359400300 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. Ramakrishna ◽  
H. Hamada ◽  
N.K. Cuong

It has been shown that knitted fabric reinforced thermoplastic composites can be fabricated by compression moulding in two ways namely, film stacking method and co-knitted fabric method. The processability of co-knitted fabric method was better than the film stacking method. Tensile properties in the wale direction of the knitted fabric were higher than those of the course direction.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chenping Zhang ◽  
Yugang Duan ◽  
Hong Xiao ◽  
Ben Wang ◽  
Yueke Ming ◽  
...  

Abstract Manufacturing thermoplastic composites (TPC) with excellent mechanical properties requires advanced methods with reduced costs and better overall efficiencies. In this study, fiber-reinforced thermoplastic polymer composite laminates were manufactured using an automated fiber placement (AFP) manufacturing technology. The effects of processing temperature (from 320 ℃ to 500 ℃), lay-up speed (from 20 mm/s to 260 mm/s), consolidation force (from 100 N to 600 N), and prepreg tape tension (from 0 N to 9 N) on the quality of the resulting laminates manufactured using the laser AFP system were investigated. The interlayer bond strength was characterized using wedge peel tests on samples prepared with different process parameters. The studies were complemented by measurements of the thermal properties of the composites using different scanning calorimetry. The optimized process parameter windows were determined to be 360 ℃ to 400 ℃ for the irradiation temperature, 140 mm/s to 160 mm/s for the lay-up speed, 100 N for the consolidation force, and 3 N to 5 N for the prepreg tape tension, respectively. The microscopic analysis of the cross-sections and peel-damaged surfaces revealed that the different distributions of the resin matrix resulting from the different processing parameters affected the interlayer strength. These results may provide an important reference for manufacturing TPC used in aerospace, defense, and automotive applications.


2017 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 37-51 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mazlina Mohd Tahir ◽  
Wen-Xue Wang ◽  
Terutake Matsubara

This study proposes a novel tab for the tensile testing of unidirectional (UD) carbon fiber-reinforced thermoplastic polyamide 6 (CF/PA6) to reduce stress concentration at the tab end. The length of the new tab is identical to that of the UD CF/PA6 specimen to avoid a sudden change in geometry that is typically observed in a conventional tab end. Additionally, three types of UD CF/PA6 laminates from different manufacturers are used to fabricate tensile specimens. Specimens with a new tab and a conventional nontapered tab are tested under quasi-static tension. Finite element simulations of tensile testing are also performed for specimens with two types of tabs. The experimental and simulation results demonstrate that the newly designed tab reduces the stress concentration at the tab end by approximately 10% and improves the estimates of tensile strength for the UD thermoplastic composite laminates.


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