DYNAMICS OF VOID FORMATION UPON （空隙形成的动力学）.pdfVIP

DYNAMICS OF VOID FORMATION UPON CURING OF EPOXY RESIN Yongsung Eom, Louis Boogh, Véronique Michaud, Paul Sunderland and Jan-Anders Månson* Laboratoire de Technologie des Composites et Polymères (LTC) Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) CH-1015 Lausanne, SWITZERLAND SUMMARY: The role of internal stresses in the formation of voids during cure of neat epoxy resin and fibre reinforced epoxy has been identified. The combined evolution of the modulus and of the volume shrinkage often leads to voiding when the resin is constrained during cure. To analyse this phenomenon, the shrinkage of an epoxy resin was studied in a constrained volume. Void initiation was observed at two different stages during isothermal cure, before gelation and around or after gelation. A corresponding critical internal stress at void initiation was calculated by viscoelastic analysis. This stress criterion is used to construct a process window for production of void-free composites. KEYWORDS: void formation, internal stresses, process window INTRODUCTION Prepreg lay-up and autoclave cure is one of several important processes used in obtaining high quality fibre reinforced thermoset composite structures. High temperature and high pressure are usually used to reduce the resin viscosity and to suppress voids during the consolidation of the composite. One of the major concerns during composite processing is therefore to control the formation of defects such as voids in the resin. Four different mechanisms have been identified as the cause of such defects. They include: (1) mechanical trapping of air between plies during the lamin