Ply and interlaminar behaviours of 3D printed continuous carbon fibre-reinforced thermoplastic laminates; effects of processing conditions and microstructure

Abstract

Taking advantage of an extended design and manufacturing space for composites, the technology of Fused Filament Fabrication (FFF) of continuous fibre-reinforced thermoplastics shows great potential for the production of the next generation of lightweight structural parts. This novel process is very much under development, and knowledge of the mechanical behaviour of the resulting 3D-printed materials is still limited. In this work, the intra-and inter-laminar behaviours of carbon fibre/polyamide printed laminates were extensively characterised to determine ply elastic and strength properties, as well as interface strength and fracture characteristics. Moreover, the effects of eventual production defects on these properties were analysed, putting in evidence some of the present shortcomings of the FFF process. Such defects include non-homogeneous fibre distribution, large amounts of intra-and interlaminar voids, and weak interlayer bonding, which are likely to be due to insufficient thermo-mechanical consolidation of the material during the FFF process, and have significant influence on the matrix-dominated mechanical properties. As a result, the transverse and interlaminar properties were found to be lower than those obtained through Hot Compression Moulding of an equivalent material. Besides highlighting possible process improvements, the mechanical characterisation carried out in this work promises a significant

Ultrafast printing of continuous fiber‐reinforced thermoplastic composites with ultrahigh mechanical performance by ultrasonic‐assisted laminated object manufacturing

“…The composites without HPP exhibited a high average ILSS of 32.1 MPa, and HPP samples showed a 31% higher ILSS of 42.2 MPa. As shown in Table 4, the CFRTPCs fabricated by the proposed method exhibited better ILSS than most of the results of FDM reported in 10,15,20,42,46 …”

“…Table 3 shows a summary of the average tensile strength, modulus, and SD of the AM CFRTPCs. Figure 4B shows the tensile property map of this work compared with fiber composites fabricated by FDM, 11,12,15,16,20,[36][37][38][39]41,42 extrusion, 43 SLS, 35,43 SLA, [43][44][45] and LA-LOM. 21 The HPP unidirectional CFRTPCs prepared by the proposed method exhibited impressive tensile strength and stiffness, which are 80% and 27% higher than the strongest FDM printed CFRTPCs, respectively.…”

“…As shown in Table 4, the CFRTPCs fabricated by the proposed method exhibited better ILSS than most of the results of FDM reported in. 10,15,20,42,46…”

Additive Manufacturing-Based In Situ Consolidation of Continuous Carbon Fibre-Reinforced Polycarbonate

“…Unidirectional 3D-printed continuous carbon fibre-reinforced composites have enhanced properties like high tensile strength and high modulus of elasticity along the fibre axis [ 1 ]. In addition, composite materials have an excellent stiffness to weight ratio and therefore these materials are mostly used in industries like aviation, aerospace and motor sports.…”

The effect of UV irradiation on polyamide 6/carbon-fiber composites based on three-dimensional printing

“…Recently, many researchers have focused on manufacturing processes such as three-dimensional (3D) printing for manufacturing complex shapes at a relatively lower cost than conventional processing methods [8][9][10][11][12][13][14]. 3D printing systems have grown rapidly in recent years owing to their low cost, accessibility, and open source technology.…”