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Freddy Y. C. Boey
Nanyang Technological Institute, Nanyang Avenue, Singapore 2263
ABSTRACT
To obtain acceptable accuracy and consistency in the mechanical testing
of polymeric fibre reinforced composities, it is important that both the
fibre alignment and the void content be precisely controlled. In
particular, a high void content can greatly affect both the variability and
the value of the mechanical strengths of the composite. This paper
describes the use of a simple vacuum injection moulding process to
produce fibre reinforced composites that have a consistently low void
content, of about 1.3%, and a correspondingly high and consistent
flexural strength.
INTRODUCTION
EXPERIMENTAL PROCEDURE
Figure 1 shows a schematic illustration of the mould set up. The mould
was made of a flat 10 m m thick alumium plate, with a 5 m m deep and
366 Freddy Y. C. Boey
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368 Freddy Y. C. Boey
10 m m wide resin channel milled all around it for the resin intake. Each
side was given an excess of 25 m m for sealing the bagging sheet. Four
resin inlets were made, allowing for even and thorough flow of the
resin.
Figure 2 shows the schematic illustration of the whole vacuum
injection moulding process. A vacuum probe connected the vacuum
pump to the vacuum bagging. The resin trap was necessary to ensure
that no resin penetrated into the vacuum pump. The probe used was a
simply fabricated aluminium disc with an adhesive tape connection to
the vacuum bagging (Fig. 3). A commercially available quick discon-
nect probe can also be used, 9 although the former simple probe was
NYLON PERFORATION
VACUUM BAGGING
SECTION A-A
faster and more evenly. Hot curing inside a standard oven, or even in
an autoclave, is possible. For this project, all hot curing systems were
cured inside an autoclave (designed in our laboratory) which has a
built-in vacuum hose system.
Cold curing resins have higher viscosities and took a longer time to
thoroughly impregnate the fibre network. Experience showed that in
using cold curing systems, it was important to ensure that sufficient time
was available for the resin to penetrate into the fibre network
thoroughly before gelation commenced. If gelation is initiated during
resin intake, due to the rapid increase in the resin viscosity, resin intake
would rapidly decrease in speed, with the viscosity still increasing all
the time. Eventually, the vacuum line would get totally choked up. The
lag time to gelation initiation is often very sensitive to the amount of
catalyst or hardener added to the cold curing resin systems. A higher
amount of catalyst or hardener results in a faster cure time, but also a
shorter lag time to gelation initiation. It is, therefore, necessary to
optimise between the two time factors to obtain the ideal ratio of
catalyst/resin.
For the work reported here, the Eporez 15 system, which is a low
viscosity modified bisphenol A-epichlorohydrin epoxide resin, was
used with a T E T A curing agent. The system averaged about 0-5 m/h
for a single vacuum probe/double resin inlet system, which thoroughly
impregnated the flat panel, shown in Fig. 1, in less than 30 min. The
resin system started to gel significantly in 45 min. By using a double
vacuum probe/double resin inlet system, the time to total inpregnation
was reduced by about 50% to 13 min, thus allowing for the use of a
slightly higher amount of catalyst and shortening the curing time.
The fibre mats used were from an E glass cross woven (0, 90) fibre
system. Hot curing was effected in an autoclave (designed in our
laboratory) capable of 20 bars pressure, 50 mbar maximum vacuum and
a temperature of up to 200C. Both vacuum and pressure were
controlled with a Honeywell multicontroller. Details of the autoclave as
well as the lay up procedure can be found in Ref. 1. Although the
vacuum pump was capable of going down to 50 mbar, in practice, due
to the high partial pressure caused by the resin volatiles and the
relatively high resin viscosity, the lowest consistently attainable vacuum
was about 0.25 bar.
For all specimens, 24 plies of the cross woven fibre glass were used to
produce a panel of 2.5 mm x 300 mm x 600 mm dimensions, from which
specimens of dimensions 2-5 mm x 25 mm x 80 mm were cut out for
both the mechanical strength tests and the void content tests.
Determination of the void content was performed according to
Reducing void content and its variability using VIM 371
Figure 4 shows the result of the void content and the flexural strength
versus the specimen position across the diagonal of the composite
panel, when only one probe was used, placed at the centre of the panel,
as shown in Fig. 1. The horizontal axis shows the specimen position,
with positions 1 and 8 at both ends of the diagonal, and the other
positions spaced equally along the diagonal. Variation in the percentage
void content was large, with a lower void content at the ends. This was
because the resin intake (Figs 1 and 2) came from the end perimeter of
the panel, so that the resin would have had a longer time to saturate
the fibres. Results for the conventionally hand laid-up panel are shown
for comparison (dashed line), averaging between 3 to 5% void content.
372 Freddy Y. C. Boey
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Reducing void content and its variability using VIM 373
TABLE 1
Properties for the Three Processes
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376 Freddy Y. C. Boey
CONCLUSION
ACKNOWLEDEGMENT
REFERENCES