Non-destructive injectability measurements for fibre preforms and semi-finished textiles

Abstract Current production trends and demands for Fibre Reinforced Plastics are exceeding the capabilities of classical, recognised inspection and test methods, especially their capabilities to monitor the mass production of carbon fibre reinforced plastic parts. Novel non-destructive measurement methods to efficiently perform quality assurance within industrial mass production are required. This research is focused on a novel method to assess the properties of textile reinforcements employed in liquid composite moulding processes. This method non-destructively measures the resistance provided by semi-finished textiles to compressive deformation and fluid flow. Rather than calculating permeability using traditional methods, simple measures of injectability of textile reinforcements are determined using an air pulse applied within the stack or preform. On this basis, a simple, mobile prototype device has been developed to support production and quality control to evaluate the injectability and compressibility properties of stacks and preforms and gather information about processes and systems.