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The advantages of building aircraft structures with composites, compared to metal, include light weight, high specific strength, superior fatigue properties, damage tolerance and the absence of corrosion.
Composite materials are engineered combinations of two or more distinct materials, merging their individual properties to create a new material with enhanced characteristics. Typically composed of a reinforcing phase (like fibers or particles) embedded within a matrix (often a polymer, metal, or ceramic), composites leverage the strengths of each component to achieve superior strength, stiffness, lightness, or other desirable attributes. Their versatility extends across industries, from aerospace and automotive to construction and sports equipment, where their tailored design and exceptional properties offer solutions for high-performance applications.
Resin infusion is a method used in composite manufacturing to impregnate dry reinforcement materials, like fibers or fabrics, with a liquid resin. This process involves placing the dry reinforcement in a mold and then introducing the resin under vacuum pressure, allowing it to permeate the reinforcement thoroughly. The vacuum facilitates the removal of air pockets and ensures uniform resin distribution, resulting in a high-strength composite with consistent properties. Resin infusion offers advantages in creating complex shapes, minimizing waste, and producing lightweight yet durable structures.
Recycling in composites manufacturing is an evolving endeavor aimed at addressing sustainability challenges. Unlike traditional materials, composites often pose recycling complexities due to their multi-component nature. However, innovative techniques are emerging to tackle this issue. Methods like pyrolysis, mechanical recycling, and chemical processes are being developed to efficiently recover valuable components from composite waste, such as fibers or matrix materials.
Tools and software used to design, simulate, optimize and assess physical properties of composite parts and structures
The complexity and costs of design and manufacture with composite materials lend them well to structural applications like aircraft wings, boat hulls, and car bodies. However, one of the largest markets by volume for composites is consumer goods, including electronics, sporting goods, bathtubs and swimming pools, bicycles, recreational vehicles (RV) and more.
Carbon fiber is a high-performance reinforcement widely employed in composite materials due to its exceptional strength-to-weight ratio and stiffness. Composed of thin strands of carbon atoms, these fibers are renowned for their incredible durability and resistance to various environmental factors. In composite applications, carbon fiber offers outstanding structural support while remaining lightweight, making it a preferred choice in aerospace, automotive, and sports equipment.
Composites have been used in space since our early steps into the cosmos. Often turned to for their light weight and high strength, these materials have a history of use in spaceflight in such applications as payload fairings, satellite structures and heat shields.
â–º Explore the technologies, materials and strategies used by composites manufacturers working in the evolving space market at our virtual CW Tech Days: New Space Applications. Learn more and register here!
Infused, fiberglass/polyester composite boat hulls have been built since the mid-1900s, expanding over time to include additional resins and foam cores. Composites continue to be a mainstay for various types of boats and luxury and racing yachts, and now include newer innovations such as carbon fiber precision hydrofoils and recycled carbon fiber or bio-based resins.
Reinforcements in composites are crucial elements that fortify the overall structure by providing strength, stiffness, and tailored properties to the material. Typically in the form of fibers, such as carbon, glass, or aramid, these reinforcements are strategically embedded within a matrix material, often a polymer, to create composite materials. The choice of reinforcement dictates the final characteristics of the composite, with each type offering distinct advantages: carbon fibers for high strength and stiffness, glass fibers for cost-effectiveness and corrosion resistance, and aramid fibers for exceptional impact resistance.
Additive manufacturing, commonly known as 3D printing, has revolutionized composite production by enabling the layer-by-layer construction of intricate composite structures. In the realm of composites, additive manufacturing techniques allow for the creation of complex geometries with precise fiber orientations and resin distribution, optimizing material performance. This technology offers the flexibility to customize parts, reduce waste, and experiment with novel composite combinations. By depositing materials layer upon layer, additive manufacturing facilitates the production of lightweight, high-strength components tailored for specific applications in industries such as aerospace, automotive, and healthcare, pushing the boundaries of what's achievable in composite design and fabrication.
Processes in composites manufacturing encompass a diverse array of techniques employed to fabricate composite materials. These processes include methods like hand layup, where layers of resin and reinforcement materials are manually placed, and vacuum infusion, where a vacuum draws resin into a preform. Other techniques like compression molding, filament winding, and automated methods such as 3D printing are utilized to create intricate and specialized composite structures. Each process offers unique advantages in terms of precision, scalability, and efficiency, catering to diverse industry needs. As technology advances, newer methods are emerging, promising faster production cycles, reduced waste, and increased customization, driving the evolution of composite manufacturing towards more sophisticated and versatile methodologies.
The role of composites in construction (or infrastructure) is varied, ranging from building of bridges and exterior building cladding, to window linneals and timber reinforcements, to reinforcing concrete structures with composite rebar or fiber-reinforced concrete. However they are used, the lightweighting, design flexibility and durability benefits of composites can help speed construction and improve a building’s sustainability score.
Compression molding is a widely employed technique in composite manufacturing, involving the use of heat and pressure to shape composite materials. In this process, a pre-measured amount of composite material, often in the form of sheets or pellets, is placed into a mold cavity. The mold is then closed and subjected to high pressure and temperature, allowing the material to conform to the shape of the mold. As the material compresses and solidifies, it forms the desired product. Compression molding is favored for its ability to produce complex shapes with high fiber volume fractions, ensuring strong and consistent composite parts.
The wind energy market has long been considered the world’s largest market, by volume, for glass fiber-reinforced polymer (GFRP) composites — and increasingly, carbon fiber composites — as larger turbines and longer wind blades are developed, requiring higher performance, lighter weight materials. The outer skins of wind and tidal turbine blades generally comprise infused, GFRP laminates sandwiching foam core. Inside the blade, rib-like shear webs bonded to spar caps reinforce the structure. Spar caps are often made from GFRP or, as blade lengths lengthen, pultruded carbon fiber for additional strength.
Composites are used frequently in motorsports and lower volume, high-end/luxury vehicles, which typically favor continuous carbon fiber materials. They are also often used to fabricate exterior structures in racing vehicles, where their relative light weight provides speed and performance advantages over metals.
Within mid- and high-volume production vehicles, common composite applications include glass fiber-reinforced polymer (GFRP) leaf springs, suspension components, and drive shafts, sheet molding compound (SMC) body panels and frames; bulk molding compound (BMC) housings and support structures; and injection-molded thermoplastics for bumper frames, lift gates and seat structures.
Injection or overmolding techniques in composites involve the process of injecting or molding a composite material over a pre-existing structure or component, enhancing its functionalities or adding protective layers. This method allows for the combination of different materials, such as polymers or composite resins, to create a cohesive and integrated final product. It's commonly used to reinforce or encapsulate parts, providing improved strength, durability, and resistance to environmental factors.
Pultrusion is a manufacturing process integral to composite production, involving the continuous pulling of reinforcing fibers through a resin bath and then through a shaping die, where they are cured and formed into a constant cross-sectional profile. This method, known for its efficiency and precision, is commonly used for producing continuous profiles with consistent dimensions and exceptional strength.
Bonding and welding play vital roles in the assembly and fabrication of composite materials, offering methods to join components together effectively. Bonding involves the use of adhesives or bonding agents to create strong connections between different composite parts or between composites and other materials. Adhesives provide uniform stress distribution, enabling lightweight and durable structures. On the other hand, welding techniques like ultrasonic welding or induction welding are employed specifically in thermoplastic composites, where heat is used to melt and fuse the materials together.
Designers of composite parts can choose from a huge variety of fiber reinforcements and resin systems, a situation that gives infinite design freedom but adds to composites’ complexity. Along with cost factors, knowledge of material properties is a prerequisite to satisfactory product design. The mechanical properties, orientation, and type of fibers; the properties of the resin; the fiber-to-resin ratio and behavior of the combined materials; and the intended fabrication process are all factors to consider in the design of a composite part.