Analysis and optimization of temperature distribution in carbon fiber reinforced composite materials during microwave curing process

Abstract

Vacuum assisted microwave curing technologies and modified optical sensing systems have been employed to investigate the influence of ply orientation and thickness on through-thickness temperature distribution of carbon fiber reinforced composite laminates. Two different types of epoxy systems have been studied. The results demonstrated that the ply orientation did not affect the temperature distribution of composite materials. However, the thickness was an important influencing factor. Nearly 10 °C temperature difference was found in 22.5mm thick laminates. Through analyzing the physical mechanisms during microwave curing, the temperature difference decreased when the heat-loss in surface laminates was reduced and the absorption of microwave energy in the center laminates was improved. The maximum temperature difference of the samples formed using themodified microwave curing technologies in this research could be reduced by 79% to 2.1 °C.Compared with the 5.29 °C temperature difference of laminates using thermal heating process, the maximum temperature difference in laminates using modified microwave curing technologies was reduced by 60%, and the curing time was cut down by 25%.

A comparative experiment for the analysis of microwave and thermal process induced strains of carbon fiber/bismaleimide composite materials

“…Other researchers [5], [6] and [7] developed microwave processing of cross-ply carbon fiber/epoxy composites, experiments showing that under microwave field, thermosetting and thermoplastic composite materials can realize uniform curing and good quality. It was reported earlier by our research team [8] that, comparing microwave and thermal heating process, the temperature difference in laminates using modified microwave curing technology was reduced by 60%. Hunyar and Feher [9] developed autoclave-free systems with microwave heating techniques for composite processing, by using a special structure of microwave resonator.…”

“…Previous work of the authors [8] and Bhudolia's team [14] identified that microwave curing composite may cause arcing of the carbon fiber bundles. This phenomenon is related to conductor gaseous breakdown in electromagnetic fields.…”

Drilling delamination and thermal damage of carbon nanotube/carbon fiber reinforced epoxy composites processed by microwave curing

“…According to the measurement mechanism of fiber Bragg grating, the drilling temperature can be calculated as follows [23]:…”

Kinetics modeling of carbon‐fiber‐reinforced bismaleimide composites under microwave and thermal curing

“…Out‐of‐autoclave curing approaches, such as microwave (MW) heating, can dramatically reduce these problems . The composite manufacturing industries have already attempted to use MW curing technologies to manufacture high‐performance composites, whereas the MW curing kinetics of carbon‐fiber‐reinforced BMI composites still remains unclear.…”