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Ke, Tiantian

University of British Columbia

Understanding the thermal conductivity of 3D-printed short carbon fiber (CF)/Polyetherimide (PEI) composites is important for maintaining the quality of the additive manufacturing (AM) fabrication process especially since AM is gaining more popularity nowadays. Additionally, in aerospace applications where 3D-printed CF/PEI is used for autoclave composite tooling, it is essential to understand how the thermal properties of the tooling material affect the heat distribution and curing process of the composite parts produced on these tools to optimize tooling design. This study investigates the effective thermal conductivity of 3D-printed discontinuous CF/PEI composite, focusing on how the material microstructure affects thermal properties. Two types of melt extrusion AM or 3D-printing methods were used: Fused Filament Fabrication (FFF) and Fused Pallets Modeling (FDM). A combination of experimental and numerical analysis was used. Thermal conductivity was measured using the Transient Plane Source (TPS) technique, and the microstructure was characterized to assess fiber length, orientation, volume fraction, and void morphology. The impact of these microstructural features on anisotropic thermal conductivity was then further supported through numerical simulation using finite element analysis on the measured data. A successful tool has been established that implies the anisotropic thermal conductivity of short CF/PEI composites and how microstructure influences directional dependent thermal conductivities of short CF/PEI composites respectively. The results showed that an increase in CF volume fraction within the CF/PEI composites improved TC in the printing direction and increasing void content decreased the TC in all directions.

Text

2024-07-17

Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International

http://hdl.handle.net/2429/88661

Materials Engineering

University of British Columbia

UBCV

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/