Microstructural analysis of pre-impreganted tapes consolidation

In situ consolidation of pre-impregnated thermoplastic composite requires as much as possible intimate contact as well as an appropriate molecular diffusion across the interface where the intimate contact takes place. The last depends on the temperature that influences the molecular mobility. Thus, in order to evaluate the consolidation first we must describe accurately the composite surfaces and then, when placed in contact for manufacturing the laminate, a high-resolution simulation of the resulting thermal model must be accomplished to have access to the thermal history at the rough contact surface. In this paper based on a fractal description of the composite surface, the evolution of the intimate contact is performed by solving the flow equations during the compression. High-resolution thermal simulations based on the use of the proper generalized decomposition – PGD – are carried out on the geometrically evolving composite surface.