New additive manufacturing technology for fibre-reinforced plastics in skeleton structure

In order to process structural materials in additive manufacturing, a three-dimensional printing process with high deposition rate was developed. The process enables new design approaches for structural parts in automotive applications, combining continuous fibre-reinforced thermoplastics with short fibre-reinforced thermoplastics. For the combination of these materials, adhesion and the influence of the process parameters on adhesion is crucial. Within this study the adhesion has been measured in peel tests according to ASTM D, 6862, and the interface was investigated by optical microscopy. The adhesion process was evaluated by thermal imaging. The experiments showed that a good adhesion can be achieved during the printing process, but the continuous fibre-reinforced thermoplastic tape has to be preheated. In addition, an analytical model for the adhesion process has been introduced and validated with experimental results.