Solidification in anisotropic thermoplastic composites

Abstract Heat transfer analysis in thermoplastic composites manufacturing offers several challenges. The melting/solidification process results in the appearance of a molving solid‐fluid interface or two‐phase zone. The presence of reinforcing fibers with thermal conductivities substantially different than those of matrix meterials causes the composite material to behave anisotropically. Furthermore, an analysis should be adaptable to complex geometries if it is to be useful for practical applications. In this paper, a numerical approach is presented to develop an analysis tool for the processing of thermoplastic‐matrix composites. A numerical grid generation technique is employed to determine the temperature distribution within the part while accounting for the heat absorption and liberation during the solidification stage. The influence of anisotropy in the domain is accounted for by considering thermal conductivity as a second‐order tensor which varies continuously throughout the domain. Sample part configurations are used to demonstrate the applicability of this technique to thermoplastic composites processing.