COMBINING FUSED GRANULAR FABRICATION AND AUTOMATED FIBRE PLACEMENT FOR THE RAPID PRODUCTION OF COMPLEX SANDWICH-STRUCTURES

Abstract

Extrusion-based additive manufacturing methods like Fused Granular Fabrication (FGF) have made significant progress in recent years for their application in industrial processes. But these technologies still fall short of being usable for load bearing structures. A combination of FGF and automated fibre placement can be used to achieve a manufacturing process for parts with the strength of continous fibre reinforced laminates and freedom of design which is offered by FGF. Additionally, 3D-printing the tooling for a PAEK laminate using FGF is a cheap alternative to traditional subtractive manufacturing methods. Using incompatible polymers for the mould and the laminate allows to design a bond between those polymers which is strong enough to hold the tapes during the AFP secure in the mould while still being weak enough to allow a demoulding of the laminate. To adjust the bonding strength appropriately for a given part, the influence of certain process parameters of the AFP was investigated in this study. These results were than used to demonstrate the new cooperative form of manufacturing thermoplastic sandwich structures using FGF and AFP by producing a 600 mm × 800 mm sandwich structure with integrated conduits in a short time frame.