Carbon Fiber Layup Design Points

When using carbon fiber composite materials to make various industrial machinery parts, on the one hand, the specific requirements of the material application must be fully considered. On the other hand, the appropriate process method must be selected according to the performance characteristics of the material, so that the special characteristics of carbon fiber composite materials can be fully utilized.

Advantage. To achieve the above two points, it is necessary for the designers of product applications and the manufacturers of carbon fiber parts to have in-depth exchanges and communication. Below, Wuxi Zhishang New Materials puts forward its own opinions on the two process links of lamination and hole making based on years of practical experience, so as to provide users with reference.

The Connotation Of Lay-Up Design

The layup design mainly carries out the following contents

Determines the total number of layers for the layup. The total thickness of the product is h=n1h1+ n2h2+ n3h3, where n1, n2, and n3 are the number of layers of the corresponding material, and h1, h2, and h3 are the single-layer thickness of the material after curing.Determines the orientation angle of the ply. Reasonable layup angles can optimize the mechanical properties and other properties of local components. Currently, the commonly used standard layup angles: 0°, 45°, -45° and 90° can meet the design requirements and simplify analysis and manufacturing.

Except for the longitudinal and transverse shear strength test specimens, only when there are special requirements, any layup angle should be used, and the types of layup angles used should be as few as possible.

Determine the proportion of each direction angle of the ply

Determines the stacking order for each direction angle of each ply. To reduce distortion during curing, the overall layup sequence should be symmetrical on both sides of the centerline of the layup of the laminate structure, which is generally located in the central region of the laminate. And to ensure a uniform layup sequence, the different layup angles should be evenly distributed in the layup sequence.

Representation Of Layers

Representation of unidirectional tape plies [45/-45/0/-45/45/90/90/45/-45/0/-45/45] (Example 1), which can be simplified to [45/-45/ 0/-45/45/90]s, where 0, 45, 90, -4

With the development of the times, carbon fiber composite materials can be seen everywhere in aerospace, automobile high-speed rail, sporting goods, machinery manufacturing and other fields. In the process of manufacturing its products, carbon fiber composite materials are very different in terms of technology and performance. There is also a big difference from the design of traditional materials, in which the lay-up design is the key content of the design of carbon fiber composite materials.

Carbon Fiber Application Technology

The mechanical properties of carbon fiber composite materials are anisotropic, and their mechanical properties are closely related to the layering method of the material. In addition to the traditional plying angle, size optimization and interlayer combination optimization have also become important ways for carbon fiber composite materials to meet product process requirements and performance goals.

In order to ensure that carbon fiber composite materials meet specific stiffness requirements, Wuxi Zhishang New Materials recommends that during the initial design process, free size optimization can be used to obtain the optimal ply thickness for each ply angle. During the free size optimization process, several super layers corresponding to the plying angles are established for the composite material. At this stage, the thickness of the super layer at each plying angle can be continuously changed. Through free size optimization, the ply thickness required for each ply angle can be better determined.

However, since the laminate has certain thickness requirements during the preparation process, and the mechanical properties of the ply number pairs are greatly different. Influence. Through size optimization design, the relationship between the single layer thickness of the product and the design variables is coupled and analyzed to obtain the optimal number of plies for each ply angle under the given ply thickness.

Carbon Fiber Application Technology

The mechanical properties of carbon fiber composite materials are closely related to the order of fiber angles. In the layer group optimization stage, the actual purpose is to obtain the maximum stiffness coefficient matrix of the structure, so as to maximize the stiffness of the structure.

During the preparation process of carbon fiber parts, the laminate structure design should avoid warping deformation and resin cracks caused by coupling effects such as bending, stretching, and torsion during the curing process. For this reason, the same direction should be avoided during the laminate design process. The ply set, if used, should not exceed 4 plies.

Carbon Fiber Composite Hole Making And Cutting Tools

Holes are made on carbon fiber composite parts to meet assembly requirements with other components, such as riveting or bolts. Because carbon fiber composite materials are anisotropic, their cutting processing mechanism is different from that of metal materials. During the drilling process, a series of processing defects are prone to occur, such as delamination defects, exit burrs, fiber tears, and hole wall scratches. In addition, because the carbon fiber reinforced phase itself has extremely high hardness, it is highly abrasive.

During the processing process, the hard points mainly composed of carbon fiber can easily produce mechanical scratches on the cutting edge and flank surface of the tool, causing the cutting edge to become loose. The mouth becomes dull and a large number of scratches appear on the flank surface, causing rapid and severe wear of the tool.

Carbon Fiber Application Technology

In terms of tool materials, cemented carbide can better maintain the sharpness of the cutting edge and effectively reduce defects such as exit delamination. Diamond coating has good wear resistance and can effectively prevent tool passivation and failure. Experiments have shown that diamond Nesting drilling is beneficial to reducing delamination defects and further optimizing the drilling process parameters.

In view of the anisotropy and low interlayer adhesion of carbon fiber composite materials, Wuxi Zhishang New Materials discovered during the production process of carbon fiber composite parts that not only the drill bit material will affect the drilling performance of carbon fiber composite materials, but also different drill bits The geometric structure will also have a certain effect on chip shape, drilling axial force, drilling temperature, etc.

The emergence of various new drills such as serrated drills, candle core drills, and step drills can obtain greater critical axial force and reduce the probability of delamination. Choosing the appropriate drill bit structure in the production of carbon fiber composite parts can not only reduce tool wear and improve tool life, but also effectively improve the quality of hole making.

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What Is Carbon Fiber?Carbon fiber is made of polyacrylonitrile (PAN) (or pitch, viscose) and other organic fibers by carbonization (removal of most elements except carbon) by pyrolysis method under inert gas at high temperature above 1,000 °C. Inorganic polymer fibers with a carbon content of more than 90%.