Advisory Committee Chair
Uday Vaidya
Advisory Committee Members
Haibin Ning
Derrick R Dean
Selvum Pillay
Document Type
Thesis
Date of Award
2012
Degree Name by School
Master of Science in Materials Engineering (MSMtE) School of Engineering
Abstract
Long fiber reinforced thermoplastics (LFT) possess high specific modulus and strength, superior damage tolerance and fracture toughness and have found increasing use in transportation, military, and aerospace applications. However, one of the impediments to utilizing these materials is the lack of performance data in harsh conditions, especially at elevated temperature. In order to quantify the effect of temperature on the mechanical properties of carbon fiber reinforced thermoplastic composites, carbon fiber PAA composite plates containing 20% and 30% carbon fiber were produced using extrusion/compression molding process and tested at three representative temperatures, room temperature (RT 26°C), middle temperature (MID 60°C) and glass transition temperature (T_g 80°C). A heating chamber was designed and fabricated for the testing at elevated temperature. As temperature increases, flexural modulus, flexural strength, tensile modulus and tensile strength decrease. The highest reduction observed in stiffness (modulus) values of 30% CF/PAA at T_g in the 00 orientation is 75%. The reduction values were larger for the transverse (perpendicular to flow direction) samples than the longitudinal (flow direction) samples. The property reduction in 30% CF/PAA is larger than 20% CF/PAA. Furthermore, an innovative method was developed to calculate the fiber content in carbon fiber reinforced composites by burning off the neat resin and sample in a tube furnace. This method was proved to be accurate (within 1.5 wt. % deviation) by using burning off data obtained from CF/Epoxy and CF/Vinyl Ester samples. 20% and 30% carbon/PAA samples were burned off and carbon fiber content was obtained using this method. The results of the present study will be helpful in determining the end-user applications of these composite materials. Keywords: Long Carbon Fibers, Elevated Temperature, Mechanical Properties, Burn off Test
Recommended Citation
Wang, Qiushi, "Mechanical Properties Of Long Carbon Fiber Reinfroced Thermoplastic (Lft) At Elevated Temperature" (2012). All ETDs from UAB. 3261.
https://digitalcommons.library.uab.edu/etd-collection/3261