Multifunctional Composites - Printed Electronics for Structurally Integrated Health Monitoring of Fiber Reinforced Polymers

该项目旨在通过将电子元件集成到纤维增强复合材料中，利用增材制造技术，对多功能复合材料进行概念、制造和测试。多功能复合材料可用于结构一体化的健康监测。为了制造印刷电子产品，我们配制了基于碳纳米颗粒的导电油墨和浆料，并通过丝网印刷和喷墨印刷将其应用于纤维增强复合材料。通过这种方式，产生了导电路径和传感器等电子元件，可用于通过阻抗和容量测量来检测结构损坏。为了设计多功能复合材料，并便于对复合材料的力学和电气性能进行模拟，确定了复合材料各组分的力学和电气性能。将印刷电子元件集成到纤维增强复合材料中的方法是在导电路径或传感器与纤维增强复合材料之间建立化学键。由此产生的印刷复合材料的机械性能与普通复合材料的机械性能没有或可以忽略不计的差异。为了验证这一点，确定了局部区域的力学性能，并对整个多功能复合材料进行了静态和循环力学载荷试验。最后，建立了一个原型，以证明所开发的材料组合、打印工艺、传感器设计和定位有助于使用印刷的、高度集成的传感器在结构上集成多功能复合材料的健康监测。

This project aims at the conception, fabrication and testing of multifunctional composites which are produced by integrating electrical components into fiber reinforced composites, making use of additive manufacturing techniques. Multifunctional composites can be used to facilitate structurally integrated health monitoring. To manufacture the printed electronics, electrically conductive inks and pastes based on carbon-nanoparticles are formulated and applied to the fiber reinforced composites by means of screen printing and inkjet printing. In this way, electrical components such as conductive paths and sensors are produced which can be used to detect structural damages through impedance and capacity measurements. The mechanical and electrical properties of the components are identified to design the multifunctional composites and to facilitate the simulation of the components' mechanical and electrical behavior. The integration of the printed electrical components into the fiber reinforced composite is done in a way so that a chemical bonding is created between the conductive paths or sensors and the fiber reinforced composite. The mechanical properties of the resulting printed composites then show no or negligible difference from the mechanical properties of the plain composites. To verify this, mechanical properties of local areas are identified and the entire multifunctional composites are tested in static and cyclic mechanical load tests. At last, a prototype is built to demonstrate that the developed material combinations, printing processes, sensor designs and -positionings facilitate structurally integrated health monitoring of multifunctional composites with printed, highly integrated sensors.