Innovative forming of composite laminates

目前，由于波音787、空客A350 XWB、庞巴迪c系列和Learjet 85等更轻、更省油、更具成本效益的飞机的出现，纤维增强聚合物复合材料在航空航天工业中的应用大幅增加。当今工业的主要推动力之一是通过自动化来提高制造速度。人们非常感兴趣的是，用自动胶带铺层机快速铺成由碳纤维增强聚合物薄层制成的平面复合层压板，并将整个层压板形成所需的形状，类似于金属板成型。然而，目前对于如何将具有单向增强的高性能多轴复合材料层压板制成复杂形状的能力和理解有限。

There is currently a large increase in the use of fibre reinforced polymer composite materials in the aerospace industry because of the promise of lighter, more fuel-efficient and more cost effective airplanes, e.g. Boeing 787, Airbus A350 XWB, Bombardier C-series and Learjet 85. One of the major thrusts in industry today is to increase the speed of manufacture through automation. Of great interest is the ability to rapidly lay up flat composite laminates, made of thin layers of carbon fibre reinforced polymers, with an automated tape lay-up machine and form the whole laminate into the desired shape, similar to sheet metal forming. However, there is currently limited ability and understanding of how to form high performance multi-axial composite laminates with unidirectional reinforcement into complex shapes.