Abstract
This paper describes fabrication, evaluation and demonstration of the active laminate proposed by Asanuma. It was made by hot-pressing of an aluminum plate as a high CTE material, a unidirectional CFRP prepreg as a low CTE material and an electric resistance heater, a KFRP prepreg as a low CTE material and an insulator between them, and copper foils as electrodes. In this study, its performances such as shape change as a function of electric-resistance heating temperature were examined and compared with those of a stainless steel type one. As the results, it became clear that 1) the curvature of the active laminate linearly changes only in the fiber direction as a function of temperature between room temperature and its hot pressing temperature by electric resistance heating of carbon fiber in the CFRP layer, and 2) the active laminate was made into complicated forms, that is, a hatch and a stack types, and their actuation performances were successfully demonstrated.
