The Effect of the Parameters of T-RTM on the Properties of Polyamide 6 Prepared by in Situ Polymerization

Abstract

With the rapid development of the automotive industry, there is also a significant need to improve the raw materials used. Therefore, the demand is increasing for polymer composites with a focus on mass reduction and recyclability. Thermoplastic polymers are preferred because of their recyclability. As the automotive industry requires mass production, they require a thermoplastic raw material that can impregnate the reinforcement in a short cycle time. The most suitable monomer for this purpose is caprolactam. It can be most efficiently processed with T-RTM (thermoplastic resin transfer molding) technology, during which polyamide 6 is produced from the low-viscosity monomer by anionic ring-opening (in situ) polymerization in a tempered mold with a sufficiently short cycle time. Manufacturing parameters, such as polymerization time and mold temperature, highly influence the morphological and mechanical properties of the product. In this paper, the properties of polyamide 6 produced by T-RTM are analyzed as a function of the production parameters. We determine the crystallinity and the residual monomer content of the samples and their effect on mechanical properties.

Thermoplastic matrix‐based composites produced by resin transfer molding: A review

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Out-Of-Plane Permeability Evaluation of Carbon Fiber Preforms by Ultrasonic Wave Propagation

“…Models predictions and the experimental results on the unsaturated and saturated permeabilities are compared in Figure 8, where only the best fit among modeling and experimental data are reported. A nonlinear fit of the K 3 values as a function of fiber volume fraction has been performed using Equations ( 10) and (11), in order to obtain the fiber radius r f , whose values are reported in Table 4. The quadratic fiber arrangement is not able to properly model the experimental values, as inferred by the high differences reported in Table 4, since the obtained fiber radius is higher than the nominal value, which is equal to 3.35 µm for Preform A and 2.5 µm for Preforms B and C. Therefore, the fit obtained with the quadratic fiber arrangement with both the models are not reported in Figure 8 for the sake of clarity.…”

“…The growing demand of polymer matrix composites in several fields has also driven the research and development of new manufacturing processes. The challenge of manufacturing high quality and complex geometry components at relatively low cost and fast cycle times has pushed toward the development of liquid composite molding (LCM) processes [10,11]. These technologies usually involve the use of dry reinforcement preforms, an assembly of dry fiber layers that have been pre-shaped to the form of the desired product and bonded together using a binder resin, which are impregnated by resin injection or infusion into a mold [12,13].…”

Experimental studies on mechanical properties and toughening mechanisms of PA6/zeolite nanocomposites

“…9,10 Recent studies on nanocomposites have revealed significant improvements in mechanical, tribological and thermal properties without increasing the density of nanocomposite. 11,12 The improvement in properties because of the high reinforcing efficiency of these nanoparticles due to large aspect ratio and enhanced interaction between the nanoparticles and matrix. A number of researchers have investigated the effect of zeolite on mechanical properties of polymer nanocomposites.…”

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