Composites Design and Manufacture (BEng) - MATS 324
Process control.

The key issues are:

temperature
pressure
viscosity and flow rate
flow front position
gel-point and degree-of-cure

Sensors include electrochemical – dielectric – optical fibre – IR and Raman spectroscopy – ultrasonic – mechanical impedance analysis

Dielectric cure monitoring systems have been developed by Micromet (marketed as Episilon by the Netzsch Group), Ashland Performance Materials, formerly Signature Control Systems, (SmartTrac®) and the DYNAMIC consortium (an EU SME-2 Collective Research project), amongst others.

Process control technologies include proportional-integral-derivative, fuzzy logic and artificial neural networks.

Further reading

John Summerscales, Chapter 2: In-process monitoring for control of closed-mold techniques for the manufacture of thermosetting matrix composites,
In Gabriel O Shonaike and Suresh G Advani (editors): Advanced Polymeric Materials – Structure and Property Relationships,
CRC Press LLC, Boca Raton - Florida, April 2003, pp 57-101. ISBN 1-58716-047-1.  UOP Library  Restricted: Download 188KB .doc file

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Updated by John Summerscales on 06 March 2012 10:27. Terms and conditions. Errors and omissions. Corrections.