A Comparative Study of Pellet-Based Extrusion Deposition of Short, Long, and Continuous Carbon Fiber-Reinforced Polymer Composites for Large-Scale Additive Manufacturing

Alternative Title

A Comparative Study of Extrusion Deposition of Short, Long, and Continuous Carbon Fiber Reinforced Polymer Composites for Large-Scale Additive Manufacturing

Abstract

Pellet-based extrusion deposition of carbon fiber-reinforced composites at high material deposition rates has recently gained much attention due to its applications in large-scale additive manufacturing. The mechanical and physical properties of large-volume components largely depend on their reinforcing fiber length. However, very few studies have been done thus far to have a direct comparison of additively fabricated composites reinforced with different carbon fiber lengths. In this study, a new additive manufacturing (AM) approach to fabricate long fiber-reinforced polymer (LFRP) was first proposed. A pellet-based extrusion deposition method was implemented, which directly used thermoplastic pellets and continuous fiber tows as feedstock materials. Discontinuous long carbon fibers, with an average fiber length of 20.1 mm, were successfully incorporated into printed LFRP samples. The printed LFRP samples were compared with short fiber-reinforced polymer (SFRP) and continuous fiber-reinforced polymer (CFRP) counterparts through mechanical tests and microstructural analyses. The carbon fiber dispersion, distribution of carbon fiber length and orientation, and fiber wetting were studied. As expected, a steady increase in flexural strength was observed with increasing fiber length. The carbon fibers were highly oriented along the printing direction. A more uniformly distributed discontinuous fiber reinforcement was found within printed SFRP and LFRP samples. Due to decreased fiber impregnation time and lowered impregnation rate, the printed CFRP samples showed a lower degree of impregnation and worse fiber wetting conditions. The feasibility of the proposed AM methods was further demonstrated by fabricating large-volume components with complex geometries.

Department(s)

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering

Research Center/Lab(s)

Intelligent Systems Center

Keywords and Phrases

Additive manufacturing; Advanced materials and processing; Carbon fiber-reinforced polymer; Fiber length; High deposition rate; Long fiber reinforcement; Rapid prototyping; Solid freeform fabrication

International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)

1087-1357; 1528-8935

Document Type

Article - Journal

Document Version

Citation

File Type

text

Language(s)

English

Rights

© 2021 American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), All rights reserved.

Publication Date

01 Jul 2021

Link to Full Text

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