SBIR Phase I: Tailored Carbon Fiber Technology for High Volume Industrial Applications

这个小型企业创新研究（SBIR）第一阶段项目的更广泛的影响/商业潜力是技术，包括以低成本开发可定制的碳纤维产品和包装形式。缺乏合适的原材料和相应的工艺在很大程度上阻碍了许多大批量工业复合材料应用的开发和制造。目前的先进材料增强知识库是建立在为空间/航空航天复合材料应用开发的技术基础上的，这些应用是相对小批量和成本不敏感的市场。该项目的重点是创建一个专为大批量、成本敏感的工业复合材料应用而设计的新平台。这种先进的材料输送平台所产生的碳纤维产品可以定制，以促进目前尚未满足或服务不足的广泛工业复合材料应用，如汽车，风能和基础设施应用。 这将有可能使这些行业的性能和效率大幅提高。SBIR第一阶段项目旨在展示新的碳纤维格式技术平台的概念验证。拟议的技术平台需要提供由通用转化原料生产的具有可定制丝束线密度的碳纤维，同时寻求保持碳纤维的必要和最佳物理性能。将反复分析多水平样品的物理性质，以确定可接受的线性密度边界。将开发原型机械设备，以探索多种可行的方法来优化目标产品格式的工艺。该项目还将确定所产生的产品用于下游复合材料用途的材料处理可行性。该项目将探索碳纤维生产经济性、应用要求和产品性能的贸易空间。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project is technology that encompasses the development of customizable carbon fiber products and package formats at a low cost. Lack of suitable raw materials and corresponding processes has largely stymied the development and manufacturing of many high-volume industrial composite applications. The current advanced material reinforcement knowledge base is built on technology developed to serve space/aerospace composite material applications, which are relatively low-volume and cost-insensitive markets. This project focuses on creating a new platform designed specifically for high-volume, cost-sensitive industrial composite applications. The resulting carbon fiber products from this advanced material delivery platform can be tailored to facilitate a broad range of industrial composite applications currently unmet or underserved, such as automotive, wind energy and infrastructure applications. This will potentially enable sizable performance and efficiency gains in those industries.This SBIR Phase I project proposes to demonstrate proof-of-concept for a new carbon fiber format technology platform. The proposed technology platform entails delivering carbon fiber with customizable tow linear densities produced from a universal conversion feedstock while seeking to maintain requisite and optimal physical properties of the carbon fiber. Physical properties of multi-level samples will be analyzed iteratively to determine acceptable linear density boundaries. Prototype mechanical devices will be developed to explore multiple viable approaches to optimize processes for the target product formats. The project also will determine the material handling viability of the resulting products for downstream composite uses. The project will explore the trade space of carbon fiber production economics, application requirements, and product performance.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.