Improvement of CFRP Interlaminar Fracture Toughness and Influence of Mechanical Properties by Inserting Non-Woven Carbon Tissue

Abstract

Carbon fiber reinforced plastics (CFRPs) have been widely used in weight-critical applications such as aircrafts owing to their lightweight and excellent mechanical properties. However, a few challenges such as poor delamination toughness of CFRP laminates have impeded the wide-scale commercial application of CFRP composites. To address these issues, we conducted a feasibility study of recycled carbon fiber (CF). In this study, CFRP composites were interleaved with non-woven CF tissues (NWCTs) to improve the interlaminar fracture toughness. The results indicated that the Mode-1 fracture toughness of the composite increased remarkably upon NWCT interleaving. The initial and propagation fracture toughness increased about 6.7 times from 171 to 1148 J/m² and 4.4 times from 372 to 1644 J/m², respectively, after NWCT interleaving. A dropweight impact test and tensile test were also conducted.