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

这个小型企业创新研究（SBIR）第二阶段项目的更广泛的影响/商业潜力将是通过目前尚未商业化的定制高性能低成本碳纤维（HP-LCCF）产品来满足汽车应用的定制需求。HP-LCCF技术的更广泛影响是使氢燃料电池汽车技术能够帮助减轻化石燃料动力汽车造成的与气候变化相关的排放。 预计HP-LCCF在这方面的应用量将在十年内大幅增加。 在成功进入汽车市场后，重点将扩大到满足风能市场的需求，并通过量身定制的HP-LCCF产品，为更大、更高效的风力涡轮机提供更长的叶片。 小企业创新研究（SBIR）第二阶段项目开发了一种工艺，其中使用机电分裂工艺对重丝束碳纤维进行细分，可以保持常规丝束碳纤维线密度的可接受范围。 随后的定制试验将验证实现和保持汽车行业合作伙伴提供的线密度目标的能力，这些合作伙伴将反过来执行下游可制造性试验。 对重丝束进行细分可以无缝地进入客户的下游复合材料制造工艺，而不会产生固有的、潜在致命的重丝束缺陷。 这种缺陷通常是由横跨丝束带的横向悬链线力引起的不均匀的带内张力。 实现高带状线密度和可变带状内张力是重丝束高性能、低成本碳纤维（HP-LCCF）商业化的重要障碍。 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 II project will be to address the customized needs of automotive applications with tailored high performance-low cost carbon fiber (HP-LCCF) products that are not currently commercially available. The broader impact of HP-LCCF technology is to enable hydrogen fuel cell vehicle technologies to help mitigate the climate change linked emissions caused by fossil fuel powered vehicles. Volume projections of HP-LCCF for this application are expected to ramp up significantly over the ten years. After successful entry into the automotive market, the focus will be expanded to address needs in the wind energy market and with a tailored HP-LCCF product to enable longer blades for larger and more efficient wind turbines. This technology will help spur global adoption of clean, renewable energy sources.The Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II project develops a process where heavy tow carbon fiber is subdivided using an electromechanical splitting process that can maintain an acceptable range of regular tow carbon fiber linear densities. Subsequent tailoring trials will verify the capability to achieve and maintain the linear density targets provided by the automotive industry partners who will, in turn, perform downstream manufacturability trials. Subdividing the heavy tows enables a seamless commercial entry into customers' downstream composite manufacturing processes without an inherent, potentially fatal heavy tow defect. Such defects are typically non-uniform intra-band tension caused by the transverse catenary forces across the tow band. Achieving high band linear density and variable intra-band tension are significant barriers for the commercial adoption of heavy tow high performance, low cost carbon fibers (HP-LCCF). The process developed here may eliminate such issues and achieve commercially relevant HP-LCCF.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.