This work focuses on investigating the curing process of an epoxy-based resin—Aerotuf 275-34TM, designed for aerospace applications. To study the curing degree of Aerotuf 275-34TM under processing conditions, woven carbon fiber fabric (WCFF)/Aerotuf 275-34TM composite laminates were produced by compression molding using different processing temperatures (110, 135, 160, and 200 °C) during 15 and 30 min. Then, the mechanical behavior of the composite laminates was evaluated by tensile tests and correlated to the resin curing degree through Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) analysis. The results show the occurrence of two independent reactions based on the consumption of epoxide groups and maleimide (MI) double bonds. In terms of epoxide groups, a conversion degree of 0.91 was obtained for the composite cured at 160 °C during 15 min, while the measured tensile properties of [±45°] WCFF/Aerotuf 275-34TM laminates confirmed that these epoxy resin curing processing conditions lead to an enhancement of the composite mechanical properties.

This paper aims to derive the equivalent power-form representation for the Toda oscillator, which describes the intensity fluctuations of Nd:YAG lasers. A two-scale dimension transform is introduced to study the transient fractal response of Toda oscillator. Numerical simulations indicate that for increasing values of the fractal exponent [Formula: see text], the frequency of the Toda oscillator increases.

No abstract

In this study, the kinetic parameters belonging to the cross-linking process of a modified epoxy resin, Aerotuf 275-34™, were investigated. Resin curing kinetics are crucial to understanding the structure–property–processing relationship for manufacturing high-performance carbon-fiber-reinforced polymer composites (CFRPCs). The parameters were obtained using differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) measurements and the Flynn–Wall–Ozawa, Kissinger, Borchardt–Daniels, and Friedman approaches. The DSC thermograms show two exothermic peaks that were deconvoluted as two separate reactions that follow autocatalytic models. Furthermore, the mechanical properties of produced carbon fiber/Aerotuf 275-34™ laminates using thermosetting polymers such as epoxies, phenolics, and cyanate esters were evaluated as a function of the conversion degree, and a close correlation was found between the degree of curing and the ultimate tensile strength (UTS). We found that when the composite material is cured at 160 °C for 15 min, it reaches a conversion degree of 0.97 and a UTS value that accounts for 95% of the maximum value obtained at 200 °C (180 MPa). Thus, the application of such processing conditions could be enough to achieve good mechanical properties of the composite laminates. These results suggest the possibility for the development of strategies towards manufacturing high-performance materials based on the modified epoxy resin (Aerotuf 275-34™) through the curing process.

In this work, the Duffing’s type analytical frequency–amplitude relationship for nonlinear oscillators is derived by using Hés formulation and Jacobi elliptic functions. Comparison of the numerical results obtained from the derived analytical expression using Jacobi elliptic functions with respect to the exact ones is performed by considering weak and strong Duffing’s nonlinear oscillators.