Wind blades containing carbon fibre weigh 25% less than ones made from traditional fibreglass materials. That means carbon fibre blades could be longer than fibreglass ones and, therefore, capture more energy in locations with low wind. A switch to carbon fibre could also extend blade lifetime because carbon fibre materials have a high fatigue resistance, said Brandon Ennis, a wind energy researcher at Sandia Labs and the principal investigator for the project.

The project is funded by DOE’s Wind Energy Technologies Office in the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy. Partners on the project include Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Montana State University.

Of all the companies producing wind turbines, only one uses carbon fibre materials extensively in their blade designs. Wind turbine blades are the largest single-piece composite structures in the world, and the wind industry could represent the largest market for carbon fibre materials by weight if a material that competed on a cost-value basis to fibreglass reinforced composites was commercially available, said Ennis.

Cost is the main consideration during component design in the wind industry, yet turbine manufacturers also have to build blades that withstand the compressive and fatigue loads that blade experience as they rotate for up to 30 years.

Ennis and his colleagues wondered if a novel low-cost carbon fibre developed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory could meet performance needs while also bringing cost benefits for the wind industry. This material starts with a widely available precursor from the textile industry that contains thick bundles of acrylic fibres. The manufacturing process, which heats the fibres to convert them to carbon, is followed by an intermediate step that pulls the carbon fibre into planks. The plank-making pultrusion process creates carbon fibre with high performance and reliability needed for blade manufacturing and also allows for high production capacity.

When the research team studied this low-cost carbon fibre, they discovered it performed better than current commercial materials in terms of cost-specific properties of most interest to the wind industry.

ORNL provided developmental samples of carbon fibre from its Carbon Fiber Technology Facility and composites made from this material as well as similar composites made from commercially available carbon fibre for comparison.

Colleagues at Montana State University measured the mechanical properties of the novel carbon fibre versus commercially available carbon fibre and standard fibreglass composites. Then Ennis combined these measurements with cost modelling results from ORNL. He used those data in a blade design analysis to assess the system impact of using the novel carbon fibre, instead of standard carbon fibre or fibreglass, as the main structural support in a wind blade. The study was funded by the U.S. Department of Energy Wind Energy Technologies Office.

Ennis and his colleagues found that the new carbon fibre material had 56% more compressive strength per dollar than commercially available carbon fibre, which is the industry baseline. Typically, manufacturers accommodate a lower compressive strength by using more material to make a component, which then increases costs. Considering the higher compressive strength per cost of the novel carbon fibre, Ennis’ calculations predicted about a 40% savings in material costs for a spar cap, which is the main structural component of a wind turbine blade, made from the new carbon fibre compared to commercial carbon fibre.

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This research, valued at US$10 million, will investigate all aspects of coal-derived carbon fibre production – from computational chemistry and pitch processing to the final spinning and heat treatment process of the fibres. The aim is to produce fibres with superior properties at a lower cost than currently available.

Through this effort, ORNL researchers will work to understand the chemistry and processing conditions required to produce different grades of coal-derived carbon fibre. NETL, ORNL, and the university teams will work closely to diversify U.S. coal use in domestic manufacturing while making coal and coal-based products more attractive for export.

Because of competition from low-priced natural gas and incentivised renewable energy, the market for coal in the electric power generation sector is decreasing. However, coal-to-products opportunities can develop new markets for coal, which have the potential to offset this decrease.

For example, the market for carbon fibres is estimated to see an annual growth rate of 12 per cent through 2024, driven largely by increased use in aerospace and defence applications and in light-weighting of vehicle structures. Additional market growth is also possible in other high-volume applications, such as thermal insulation for buildings and materials for construction and infrastructure.

The $10 million that ORNL’s Carbon Fiber Technology Facility will receive comes as a part of $30 million in the fiscal year 2020 Congressional appropriations to support DOE’s Advanced Coal Processing Program. This program supports the development of technologies that can utilise coal for purposes outside the traditional thermal and metallurgical markets.

Of the $10 million funding, $4.5 million will support University of Kentucky research to determine how coal tar pitch, the carbon fibre precursor, can be tailored and optimised for the specific type of desired fibre. Additionally, $80,000 will go to Pennsylvania State University for material characterisation.

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Cost analysis done for the project say that carbon fibre sells for around $15 per pound in the United States, and the team, which includes researchers from Penn State, the University of Virginia and Oak Ridge National Laboratory, in collaboration with industry partners Solvay and Oshkosh, wants to reduce that to $5 per pound by making changes to the complex production process. A lower production cost will increase carbon fibre’s potential applications. Further, the team’s research may lower the cost of producing other types of carbon fibres, some of which sell for up to $900 per pound today.

Currently, most carbon fibres are produced from a polymer known as polyacrylonitrile, or PAN, and it is pretty costly. The price of PAN makes up about 50% of the production cost of carbon fibres.

Małgorzata Kowalik, researcher in Penn State’s Department of Mechanical Engineering

PAN is used to create 90% of carbon fibres found in the market today, but its production requires an enormous amount of energy. First, PAN fibres have to be heated to 200-300 degrees Celsius to oxidize them. Next, they must be heated to 1,200-1,600 degrees Celsius to transform the atoms into carbon. Finally, they have to be heated to 2,100 degrees Celsius so that the molecules are aligned properly. Without this series of steps, the resulting material would lack its needed strength and stiffness.

The team reported in a recent issue of Science Advances that adding trace amounts of graphene to the first stages of this process allowed the team to create a carbon fibre that had 225% greater strength and 184% greater stiffness than the conventionally made PAN-based carbon fibres.

The flat structure of graphene helps to align PAN molecules consistently throughout the fibre, which is needed in the production process. Further, at high temperatures, graphene edges have a natural catalytic property so that the rest of PAN condenses around these edges.

With the new knowledge gained from this study, the team is exploring ways to further use graphene in this production process using cheaper precursors, with a goal of cutting out one or more of the production steps altogether, thereby reducing costs even more.

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Composite materials are important to advancements in these industries because they combine the strength of fibres with the resilience of plastics. Commonly used in the aerospace sector, composites are now becoming more widely used in areas like construction (to make whole bridges, for example) and for lighter, larger and stronger wind turbines. The projects are in collaboration with the Institute for Advanced Composites Manufacturing Innovation (IACMI) and their partner companies and universities in the US.

The projects being funded are led by innovative UK composites producers, working in partnership with universities and leading research and technology organisations such as TWI and HVM Catapult Centres such as the National Composites Centre and the Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre

Simon Edmonds, Innovate UK’s, Deputy Executive Chair and Chief Business Officer

The projects are funded in the UK by the Fund for International Collaboration (FIC), which is designed to support the UK to form new and strengthen existing, bilateral partnerships for research and innovation with leading nations with a reputation for excellence. US funding has been provided by the US Department of Energy, State governments and private industry.

The seven projects, including their respective UK and USA partners, are in brief:

• CADFEC: Fibre Engineered Composites, for car components: Aston Martin and Expert Tooling and Automation, based in Coventry. U.S. partners include DowAksa, Dow Chemical, and Purdue University
• TACOMA: X-ray scanning for high-speed inspection of Automotive composite parts: TWI, Cambridge. U.S. partners include American Chemistry Council and Michigan State University
• HIPPAC: Advanced composites for stronger, lighter wind-turbine blades: Fibreforce Composites, Runcorn; Brunel University. U.S. partners include National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, GE Energy, and Montefibre
• FibreSteer: Fibre shaping for stronger aerospace components: iComat (a University of Bristol spin-out company), National Composites Centre (part of HVM Catapult) and Airbus. U.S. partners include Airbus Americas and University of Dayton Research Institute
• FibreLoop: Re-cycling carbon fibre production waste into new high-value components: NetComposites, Chesterfield; Far-UK, Nottingham and the Advanced Materials Research Centre (part of HVM Catapult). U.S. partners include Vartega, BASF, Michelman, and Michigan State University
• ENACT: Polymer layering for ‘overmoulding’, allowing more sophisticated design for complex parts: Surface Generation, Rutland, and Nottingham University. U.S. partner is Michigan State University
• TexTape: Trying to substantially reduce the costs of carbon fibre thermoplastics: Composites Evolution, Chesterfield, and National Composites. US partner is Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

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The partnership will see ORNL scientists and several faculty members within the Tickle College of Engineering at UT develop lighter vehicle components made from composite materials and to electrify vehicles.

This hub, along with other research institutions here, is an integral part of Volkswagen’s global research and development efforts and can also directly contribute to vehicles in North America

Wolfgang Demmelbauer-Ebner, executive vice president and chief engineering officer for Volkswagen’s North American

The work is being led by UT-ORNL Governor’s Chair for Advanced Composites Manufacturing Uday Vaidya. His team in the Department of Mechanical, Aerospace, and Biomedical Engineering are focusing on several research and development activities to support prototyping, develop a sheet moulding compound, and evaluate materials and their properties for use in Volkswagen vehicle components.

Researchers from the Min H. Kao Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science are focusing on research that has been pioneered by their counterparts at ORNL—the wireless charging of parked electric vehicles as well as dynamic charging, in which roadways are embedded with a system that charges electric vehicles as they move. A second project involves packaging wide bandgap power electronics in order to increase power density and efficiency hopefully reducing battery size and vehicle weight.

From the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Peebles Professor Dayakar Penumadu is providing his expertise in materials characterisation for lightweight composites.

The partnership between UT, ORNL, and Volkswagen strengthens Tennessee’s position as a significant source of innovation and talent for the Volkswagen North American manufacturing base, especially at the flagship Chattanooga facility

UT System Interim President Randy Boyd

Volkswagen is also a member of the Institute for Advanced Composites Manufacturing Innovation (IACMI), which is supported by the US Department of Energy’s Advanced Manufacturing Office. A team of IACMI undergraduate and graduate students and researchers led by Vaidya created a novel composite liftgate for the Volkswagen Atlas that reduces weight by 35 per cent, with lower investment costs and an improved environmental footprint compared to a conventional part. Researchers from ORNL, Purdue University, and Michigan State University were integral collaborators on the effort.

The new innovation hub in Knoxville will join Volkswagen’s larger global innovation ecosystem. This includes innovation centres in Belmont, USA; Wolfsburg, Germany; and Beijing, China, along with innovation hubs in Barcelona, Spain; Tel Aviv, Israel; and Tokyo, Japan.

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The boat was printed in 72 hours and is 25′ long and weighs in at just under 2.5 tonnes and won the Composites Center three Guinness World Records for the world’s largest prototype polymer 3D printer, largest solid 3D-printed object, and largest 3D-printed boat.

The new 3D printer is designed to print objects as long as 100 feet by 22 feet wide by 10 feet high and can print at 230 kgs per hour. The one-of-a-kind printer will support several ambitious initiatives, including the development of biobased feedstocks using cellulose derived from wood resources, and rapid prototyping of civilian, defence and infrastructure applications.

A $20 million research collaboration with Oak Ridge National Laboratory, the U.S. Department of Energy’s largest science and energy laboratory, will support fundamental research in key technical areas in large-scale, biobased additive manufacturing. The partnership between UMaine and ORNL will advance efforts to produce new biobased materials conducive to 3D printing of large, structurally demanding systems. The research will focus on cellulose nanofiber (CNF) production, drying, functionalization and compounding with thermoplastics, building on UMaine’s leadership in CNF technology and extrusion research. By placing CNF from wood into thermoplastics, bioderived recyclable material systems can be developed with properties that may rival traditional materials, possibly even metals.

Biobased feedstocks are recyclable and economical, providing competitive advantages for Maine’s manufacturing industries, including boatbuilding. The UMaine Composites Center received $500,000 from the Maine Technology Institute (MTI) to form a technology cluster to help Maine boatbuilders explore how large-scale 3D printing using economical, wood-filled plastics can provide the industry with a competitive advantage.

The cluster brings together the expertise of UMaine researchers and marine industry leaders to further develop and commercialize 3D printing to benefit boatbuilders in the state. By 3D printing plastics with 50% wood, boat moulds and parts can be produced much faster and are more economical than today’s traditional methods.

UMaine also showcased a 3D-printed, 12-foot-long U.S. Army communications shelter. The new printer will support programs with the U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command (CCDC) Soldier Center and its mission to develop rapidly deployable shelter systems for soldiers. Other use areas include concealment applications, structural shelters and high-temperature fire retardant materials for vehicle-mounted shelters.

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ORNL printed the lower cost trim tool in only 30 hours using carbon fibre and ABS thermoplastic composite materials, which will be tested in building the Boeing 777X passenger jet. At 17.5 feet long, 5.5 feet wide and 1.5 feet tall, the 3D printed structure is comparable in length to a large sport utility vehicle and weighs approximately 1,650 pounds.

Leo Christodoulou, Boeing’s director of structures and materials said;

The existing, more expensive metallic tooling option we currently use comes from a supplier and typically takes three months to manufacture using conventional techniques. Additively manufactured tools, such as the 777X wing trim tool, will save energy, time, labour and production cost and are part of our overall strategy to apply 3D printing technology in key production areas.

During an awards ceremony held at DOE’s Manufacturing Demonstration Facility at ORNL, where the component was 3D printed on the lab’s Big Area Additive Manufacturing machine, Guinness World Records judge Michael Empric measured the trim tool, proved it exceeded the required minimum of 0.3 cubic metres, or approximately 10.6 cubic feet, and announced the new record title.

Vlastimil Kunc, leader of ORNL’s polymer materials development team said;

The recognition by Guinness World Records draws attention to the advances we’re making in large-scale additive manufacturing composites research. Using 3D printing, we could design the tool with less material and without compromising its function.

After ORNL completes the verification testing, Boeing plans to use the manufactured trim-and-drill tool in the company’s new production facility in St. Louis and provide information back to ORNL on the tool’s performance. The tool will be used to secure the jet’s composite wing skin for drilling and machining before assembly.

View the time-lapse of the piece being made here

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LeMond Composites, a new company offering solutions for high-volume, low-cost carbon fibre, has secured a licensing agreement with US Department of Energy’s ORNL. The agreement will make the Oak Ridge-based LeMond Composites the first company to offer this new industry-disrupting carbon fibre to the transportation, renewable energy, and infrastructure markets.

A new process invented by Jackson and a research team at ORNL’s Carbon Fibre Technology Facility (CFTF) will reduce production costs by more than 50% relative to the lowest cost Industrial grade carbon fibre. Until now, manufacturing carbon fibre was an extremely energy-intensive process. This new method is claimed to reduce energy consumed during production by up to 60%.

The biggest obstacle to its widespread use has been the high cost of carbon fibre. This new process will allow high-volume, cost-sensitive industries around the world to reap the benefits of carbon fibre composites at a fraction of the cost while incorporating chemistry geared toward recyclability.

ORNL’s Carbon Fibre Technology Facility began operations in 2012, supported by the Department of Energy’s Advanced Manufacturing and Vehicle Technologies offices, to demonstrate the possibility of low-cost carbon fibre at a semi-production scale.

Growing demand from the automotive industry is due in large part to the global push to increase the fuel economy of nearly every vehicle produced. In the USA, the demand is being driven by the Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards. These standards demand a fleet-wide average fuel economy of 54.5 mpg by 2025. The single best way to improve fuel economy is to reduce the weight of the cars and their component parts.

LeMond Composites plans to expand its campus by building its first carbon fibre production line in a recently purchased facility at 103 Palladium Way in Oak Ridge. The facility is strategically located immediately adjacent to ORNL’s Carbon Fibre Technology Facility. The first commercially available product will be ready in Q1 of 2018.

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Chopped bamboo fibres were added to a bio-polymer resin to create bamboo-based pellets, resulting in a more sustainable material that can be used for manufacturing moulds, prototypes, appliances and furniture. The research team 3-D printed a table that contains 10 percent bamboo fibre composite.

Researchers behind the experiments developed 10% and 20% bamboo PLA composites which are 100% bio-based and fully sustainable. Structural and environmental benefits behind bamboo make it and interesting option for additive manufacturers, who could use the newly developed pellets as a substitute for more traditional printing materials.

Researchers are investigating the use of different types of cellulose fibres to develop feedstock materials with better mechanical performance that can increase the number of available composites and opportunities for sustainable practices.

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The process, developed by a team led by Adrian Sabau of the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, could replace the practice of preparing the surface of the materials by hand using abrasive pads, grit blasting and environmentally harmful solvents. Using a laser to remove layers of material from surfaces prior to bonding improves the performance of the joints and provides a path toward automation for high-volume use.

Our technique is vastly superior to the conventional surface preparation methods, combined with the potentially dramatic reduction in the cost of carbon fibre polymer composites, this represents an important step toward increasing the use of this lightweight high-strength material in automobiles, which could reduce the weight of cars and trucks by 750 pounds.

The surface treatment of aluminium and carbon fibre polymer composite is a critical step in the adhesive joining process, which directly affects the quality of bonded joints. Aluminium surfaces typically contain oils and other contaminants from production rolling operations while carbon fibre surfaces often contain mould releases.

“These surface contaminants affect surface energies and the quality of adhesion, so it is critical that they are removed, adding that the laser also penetrates into the top resin layer, leaving individual carbon fibres exposed for direct bonding to the adhesive and increasing the surface area for better adhesion.

Test results support Sabau’s optimism as single-lap shear joint specimens showed strength, maximum load and displacement at maximum load were increased by 15%, 16% and 100%, respectively, over those measured for the baseline joints. Also, joints made with laser-structured surfaces can absorb approximately 200 percent more energy than the conventionally prepared baseline joints, researchers reported.

Sabau noted that the process also doubles the energy absorption in the joints, which has implications for crash safety and potential use in armour for people and vehicles. Tim Skszek of Magna International a project partner said;

The results are most encouraging, enabling the automated processing of a multi-material carbon fibre-aluminium joint. With this work, we were able to focus on addressing the gaps in technology and commercial use, and we look forward to applying these findings to products.

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