Composite laminates made of unidirectional carbon fiber reinforced polymer interleaved with recycled carbon fiber and short virgin aramid fiber non‐woven mats for structural applications

Abstract The Ashby limit for mechanical damping and stiffness trade‐off must be escaped to quantify composites for structural applications. To make the composites, all the participating fibers were converted into 60 g/m² non‐woven mats, which were then sized with 1.5 wt. percent titanate coupling, TCA‐L12, before being sandwiched between two layers of 125 g/m² resin films and used to interleave 12 unidirectional carbon fiber reinforced polymer prepreg tapes. Using the vacuum‐assisted compression molding method, the assemblage was subsequently turned into composites. The impact of micro‐hybridizing recycled carbon fibers with short virgin aramid fibers on mechanical damping and stiffness trade‐offs was examined. The Ashby limit was exceeded by 1600%, and compared to the control sample, the best laminate had a figure of merit that was 15.3% higher.