Molding the Future of High Performance Composites – Designing Structure and Form Using Multiple Materials for Affordable Access to New Markets

摘要

The key to producing affordable, high-performance composites for any industry and market is to use the highly engineered composite structure where it is needed and less expensive materials where structure is less of a concern. It is important to design new composite products without the pre-conceived notion that they must be designed exactly like their metal or injection-molded counterparts. New hybrid molding techniques can enable engineers and designers to develop products that use a molded composite structure for strength in key areas, while using a low cost thermoset or thermoplastic injection molding process to complete the form of the final product. This paper will discuss: 1. Part Design; using thermoplastic and thermoset resins with a focus on carbon fiber and fiber glass matrices as well as reviewing the benefits and limitations of each material. 2. Reaction Injection Molding (RIM) over-molding techniques 3. Thermoplastic (TP) injection over-molding and co molding possibilities.