Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Wright, William Jordan
• Celik, Emrah

Titel

In Situ Electrical Network Activation and Deactivation in Short Carbon Fiber Composites via 3D Printing

Ist Teil von

• Advanced functional materials, 2023-10, Vol.33 (40), p.n/a

Ort / Verlag

Hoboken: Wiley Subscription Services, Inc

Erscheinungsjahr

2023

Quelle

Wiley Online Library

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• Prior studies on carbon‐filler based, conductive polymer composites have mainly investigated how conductive filler morphology and concentration can tailor a material's electrical conductivity and overlooks the effects of filler alignment due to the difficulty to control and quickly quantify the filler alignment. Here, direct ink write 3D printing's unique ability is utilized to control carbon fiber alignment with a single process parameter, velocity ratio, to instantaneously activate or deactivate the electrical network in composites. Maximum electrical conductivity is achieved by randomly aligning carbon fibers that enhances the chance of direct fiber‐to‐fiber contact and, thus, activating the electrical network. However, aligning the fibers by increasing the velocity ratio disrupts the electrical network by minimizing fiber‐to‐fiber contact that resulted in a drastic decrease in electrical conductivity by as much as five orders of magnitude in both short and long carbon fiber composites. With this study, this study demonstrates that electrically conductive or insulative composites can be fabricated sequentially with a single ink. This novel ability to instantaneously control the electrical conductivity of carbon fiber reinforced composites allow to directly embed conductive pathways into designs to 3D print multifunctional composites that are capable of localized heating and self‐sensing. Electrical conductivity of composites is dramatically (>5 orders of magnitude) altered when the fiber alignment is switched from random to high alignment. Using direct ink write printing and controlling a single parameter (velocity ratio), conductive or insulative specimens are fabricated from the same composite ink. Applications of the 3D printed, multifunctional composites such as self‐sensing and localized heating are explored.