Research progress of additive manufacturing process and equipment for thermoplastic composites

Abstract

Thermoplastic composites exhibit high toughness and damage tolerance, as well as good impact resistance. Additive manufacturing offers an effective way for making high-performance complex thermoplastic composite components without molds, which has a broad application prospect in aerospace and other fields. This article introduces the research progress of additive manufacturing process of short-cut fibers/continuous fibers reinforced thermoplastic composites. The processes and mechanical properties of different resins and fibers are compared. For the additive manufactured PEEK reinforced with 10%(volume fraction, the same below) of shortcut carbon fibers, the tensile strength and modulus can reach 109 MPa and 7.4 GPa, respectively, which is 85% higher than the pure PEEK. For the additive manufactured ABS reinforced with 10% continuous carbon fibers, the tensile strength and modulus can reach 147 MPa and 4.185 GPa, respectively, which is 5 times and 2 times of pure ABS. According to different processing routes and material systems, the equipment for fabricating advanced thermoplastic composites becomes larger and more integrated. Finally, from the material, equipment, process and application perspectives, the challenges and opportunities of thermoplastic composites by additive manufacture are identified.

Keywords

• thermoplastic composites
• additive manufacturing
• continuous fibers
• short-cut fibers
• in-situ consolidation