Thermoplastic laser assisted tape placement development for processing a novel carbon fiber reinforced polyphtalamide tape

Commodity and standard thermoplastics like polypropylene and polyamide 6 are often used as matrix for composites in automotive applications. These do not fulfil the temperature and media resistance requirements for certain applications. This paper demonstrates the development of the laser assisted tape placement process for a carbon fiber reinforced polyphthalamide unidirectional (UD) tape with high temperature and media resistance. By a design of experiments parameters for processing the UD tapes are defined to manufacture in-situ consolidated laminates. The bond strength and the mechanical properties are characterized by the determination of the interlaminar shear strength and three point bending tests.