Scalable production of ultrafine polyaniline fibres for tactile organic electrochemical transistors

The development of continuous conducting polymer fibres is essential for applications ranging from advanced fibrous devices to frontier fabric electronics. The use of continuous conducting polymer fibres requires a small diameter to maximize their electroactive surfaces, microstructural orientations, and mechanical strengths. However, regularly used wet spinning techniques have rarely achieved this goal due primarily to the insufficient slenderization of rapidly solidified conducting polymer molecules in poor solvents. Here we report a good solvent exchange strategy to wet spin the ultrafine polyaniline fibres at the large scale. The slow diffusion between good solvents distinctly decreases the viscosity of gel protofibers, which undergo an impressive drawing ratio. The continuously collected polyaniline fibres have a previously unattained diameter below 5 µm, high energy and charge storage capacities, and favorable mechanical performance. We demonstrated an ultrathin all-solid organic electrochemical transistor based on ultrafine polyaniline fibres, which substantially amplified microampere drain-source electrical signals with less one volt driving voltage and effectively operated as a tactile sensor detecting pressure and friction forces at different levels. The aggressive electronical and electrochemical merits of ultrafine polyaniline fibres and their great potentials to prepare on industrial scale offer new opportunities for high-performance soft electronics and large-area electronic textiles.

Investigation of consecutive two-stage hydrodynamic deep drawing of aluminum cylindrical cups

In the deep drawing process, achieving a higher drawing ratio has always been considered by researchers. In this study, a new concept of hydrodynamic deep drawing with two consecutive stages without additional operations such as annealing is proposed to increase the limit drawing ratio of the cups. The effective parameters were investigated numerically and experimentally in the forming of Al1200 cylindrical cups. At first, the desired value of punch diameter ratio was determined based on finite element simulation results and was utilized to increase the cup formability. Next, the effects of pressure paths on the cup thickness, separation, and rupture were studied in each forming stage. The cup formability was investigated based on a new proposed framework to obtain the maximum possible limiting drawing ratio, and the desired conditions were determined. Finally, a cup was formed with a high drawing ratio of 3.4 which was a good achievement in comparison with the literature.

Differential scanning calorimetry/small-angle X-ray scattering analysis of ultraviolet sensible polypropylene filaments

In this work, ultraviolet (UV) sensible metallocene isotactic polypropylene (miPP) filaments were produced with different drawing ratios and various concentrations of photochromic pigment. The effects of pigment concentration and drawing ratio on the chromatic properties and the structural modification for the miPP filaments were studied extensively by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and small- and wide-angle X-ray scattering (SAXS/WAXS) measurements. The change in melting temperature and the polymeric structures, such as lamellar thickness, long period and degree of crystallinity of miPP with the addition of a UV sensible pigment into miPP and the drawing process, were evaluated. The results show that the pigment concentration and the drawing ratio influence the inner structure of miPP filaments. Finally, our investigation shows that SAXS and also WAXS are appropriate to determine the lamellar thickness and the degree of crystallinity established by the DSC approach. This work attempts to correlate the results of lamellar thickness, the degree of crystallinity and the higher-order structure of the polymer acquired by DSC as well as X-ray diffraction (XRD) techniques in order to develop an appropriate approach to find the influence of pigment concentration and drawing ratio on miPP filaments.

Oriented polylactic acid/graphene oxide nanocomposites with high mechanical and thermal properties

Oriented polylactic acid (PLA)/graphene oxide (GO) nanosheets tapes were prepared via uniaxial solid state drawing. The effect of various drawing conditions, including drawing ratio (DR), temperature (DT), and speed (DS) on mechanical, thermal, structural, and barrier properties were studied. Structural studies showed oriented structure for the drawn tapes with aligned polymer chains and GO nanosheets. Differential scanning calorimetry revealed improved glass transition temperature (Tg) and crystallinity (Xc) after drawing. In addition, Tg and Xc were increased more by increasing DR and DT. The highest Tg and Xc were achieved for 3/70/50 tape with values of 73°C and %22, respectively. Higher thermal stabilities and enhanced barrier properties were achieved after drawing, especially at the higher DR. Finally, tensile testing revealed simultaneous improvement in stiffness and toughness due to strain hardening for all the drawn tapes. The strength and elastic modulus were increased after increasing DR, DS, and DT and reached the highest values of 149 MPa and 3.6 GPa for 3/70/50. Overall, the properties were controllable by the processing conditions.

Effect of Interface on the Deep Drawability of Ti/Al Multilayered Composites

Ti/Al multilayered composites (LMCs) with different layers were prepared by hot-pressing and hot-rolling. The effects of interface on the deep drawability of LMCs were explored. The results indicate that LMCs with more layers have a higher limit-drawing ratio (LDR) and exhibit an excellent deep drawability. The texture strength of the Ti layer gradually weakens with the increase of layers, which leads to the smaller yield ratio (σs/σb), the plastic strain ratio (r), and the larger strain hardening index (n), thus the deep drawability of LMCs with more layers is enhanced effectively. The Ti/Al interfaces in three, five, and seven layers of LMCs exhibit straight, small wave-like interlocking, and dense serrated structures at the corner of the cylindrical parts, respectively. The component metals become thinner with the increase of layers, and the increased interfacial pressure promotes the formation of an increasingly firm overlapped interfacial structure. The load transfer via the interfaces makes the stress distribution between layers more uniform with the increase of layers, which helps to coordinate deformation. Deflection and tearing occur when the cracks propagate to the interface due to the complex stress state, which hinders and delays the crack penetration, thereby improving the deep drawability of LMCs with more layers.

Magnetic Medium-Assisted Inverse Bulge Pre-Forming and Deep Drawing Composite Forming Process for Improving Forming Performance of the Cylindrical Parts

Due to the poor plasticity of aluminum alloy at room temperature, it is difficult to form thin-walled and complex curved parts. This paper proposes a composite method of inverse bulge pre-forming deep drawing based on intelligent magnetorheological (MR) fluid materials. Through the experiments and finite element modeling of cylindrical parts with drawing ratios of K1=2.125 and K2=2.25 were carried out under different forming conditions. The effect of soft mold medium on the drawing forming of cylindrical parts was studied. The research results show that the uniformity of the wall thickness of the parts is enhanced after using the soft mold medium. When the inverse bulge height is about 9mm and 5mm, the wall thickness variance of the cylindrical part is 0.0023 and 0.0025 pectively, which is reduced by 86.31% and 82.8% respectively. In the pre-forming stage, as the height of inverse bulge is increased, the maximum equivalent stress moves from the fillet area of the blank holder to the outer surface of the highest point of the bulging area. Taking drawing ratio of K1=2.125 as an example, the circumferential compressive stress in the flange area decreases and is distributed unifomly under the back pressure and soft drawbeads, the radial stress gradient and equivalent stress gradient at the fillet of die are reduced; For cylindrical parts with drawing ratios of K1=2.125 and K2=2.25, when the inverse bulge height is 9mm and 5mm, the forming effect of the part is the best.

Effects of Variable Punch Speed and Blank Holder Force in Warm Superplastic Deep Drawing Process

A cylindrical deep drawing test was conducted for the purpose of improving the drawability, product accuracy, and quality in warm deep drawing using a superplastic material with large strain rate dependence. Then, the effects of blank holding force (BHF) and punch speed (SPD) on the flange wrinkle behavior and wall thickness distribution were investigated by experiments and theoretical analysis. A Zn-22Al-0.5Cu-0.01Mg alloy superplastic material SPZ2 with a sheet thickness of 1 mm was employed as the experimental material, and a cylindrical deep drawing experiment with the drawing ratio (DR) of 3.1 and 5 was performed at 250 °C. A good agreement was qualitatively obtained between the elementary theory on the flange wrinkle limit, the fracture limit, and the experimental results. In addition, the authors examined each variable BHF and SPD method obtained from the theory and experimentally demonstrated that the variable BHF method has a great effect on uniform wall thickness distribution and that variable SPD has a great effect on shortening the processing time for superplastic materials. Furthermore, the authors demonstrated the effectiveness of the variable BHF/SPD deep drawing method that varies both BHF and SPD simultaneously.

Roll Casting of Al-Mg-Si Alloy

The aluminum alloy Al–5%Mg–2%Si, the chemical content of which is close to that of the Magsimal-59 aluminum alloy commonly for die casting, was successfully cast into strips using a vertical high-speed twin-roll caster at a speed of 30 m/min. This means that Al–5%Mg–2%Si is suitable for the high-speed twin roll-casting. The as-cast Al–5%Mg–2%Si strip was then successfully cold-rolled to a thickness of 0.7 mm. Tension and cup tests were conducted on the cold-rolled annealed strips. The tensile stress was 205 MPa and the elongation was 20% for a thickness of 1 mm. The limiting drawing ratio was 2.0 at a 0.7 mm thickness. The present results demonstrates that Al–5%Mg–2%Si can be used for die casting and sheet forming. This means that use of this alloy for both sheet forming and die casting could eliminate the need for the separation of wrought aluminum alloys from cast aluminum prior to processing at recycling plants.

Analysis of Fiber Drawing in Wet Spinning for Surface Roughness

The drawing process behavior was investigated with focus on fiber stretching speed (spinning acceleration) to improve luster quality of fibers. Wet spinning method has a limitation of low luster at high spinning speed. It was determined that (1) luster quality could be evaluated by arithmetic average (RΔa) of fibers, which indicated the roughness, and (2) the roughness of the fiber was related to the spinning acceleration through the analysis of RΔa. Spinning acceleration was measured by chasing markers that were used to tie fibers. Regardless of the length of spinning bath, fibers were mainly stretched during the first stretching stage. Therefore, a multistep drawing method was used. In the case where the drawing ratio was 220% by one-step, RΔa was 10.1°; however by multi-step drawing (1st and 2nd drawing ratios were 148.3%), RΔa decreased to 8.3°. The multi-step drawing method enabled the reduction in fiber roughness by preventing a sudden change in fiber stress. In addition, high temperatures improved the fiber roughness. At high temperatures, roughness decreased despite the high acceleration because the fiber was easier to stretch than at low temperatures.