Co-cure bonding method for foam core composite sandwich manufacturing

Abstract

The conventional manufacturing of composite sandwich structures is completed by adhesive joining separately prepared composite faces to cores. The joining process during sandwich fabrication is most difficult process, which requires strict quality control. The joining process can be eliminated when the sandwich structures are manufactured by co-cure method inside a mold using the large coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE) of foam cores. In this work, the foam core composite sandwich beams were manufactured inside a mold using the pressure generated due to the difference of CTEs between the mold and the foam. Considering the non-linear thermal expansion properties of foam during co-cure manufacturing, the pressure generated inside the mold was analyzed and calculated. In addition, the calculated pre-compression strain was given to the foam core sandwich beams for enough consolidation of the composite faces. (C) 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.