As a final blog we want to give you a link to our “My statement paper”. In this paper we reflect over the posts in this blog and we are focusing on the good and bad properties of carbon fiber, and how it is possible that this new material can make our world a better place.
The my statement paper can be found here: 4424_ShortPaper & 4423_ShortPaper
This 25 minute tutorial, made by Matthieu Libeert explains that working with carbon fibre isn’t actually all that difficult. It’s a great material, like glass fibre, which you can easily use in your own garage. In this tutorial he explains how you can fix a broken carbon fibre bicycle frame. This can be done for less then 25 euro! There is only one expensive part needed and that’s a vacuum pomp. I wanted to show this because a lot of people still think that carbon fibre is really hard to work with and it can only be done by professionals, this is true if you want to build aircraft graded parts.
But this is definitely not the case for simple consumer products. There is only one thing you have to remember, preparation is everything. When we build parts for our formula car we sometimes need to days of preparation for a part wich only takes to hours to work. One thing you have to keep in mand is the working time of the resin, you have to be finished by the end of that timeslot.
So get out, read about it and make your own carbon of fiberglass parts! It really isn’t that difficult!
Some more interesting tutorials can be found on Matthieu’s youtube channel (https://www.youtube.com/user/matthieutje65) and on http://www.easycomposites.co.uk
Did you ever sail a boat? I did, but I never thought about doing this.
Alex thomson is a major talent in international yacht racing. With Hugo BOSS being the sponsor of his racing team, he needed to have a rather stylish videoclip to go viral and let the world see in what kind of extreme conditions they still have control of their vessel. For your information, this vessel is very similar to the F1-cars or even our little monocoque-project. They also use a sandwich structure for the hull. Because everything is about speed, every component has been made as light as possible but still be able to withstand enormous forces. Not that walking across the mast in a suit is an enormous force, but you know what I mean.
The mast over which Alex Thomson is walking here, is a 30 meter long carbon fiber mast. This stunt was an upgrade from his first stunt, being the `Keel Walk` were he stands on one of the keels of the sailboat while sailing at high speeds.
What do you think about this stunt? Are you ready to walk the mast?
I think i’d tried, but only in a suit.
Motorsport has always been dangerous, but big steps forward have been taken. Seen in the picture below we can see a man, without any roll over protection and with his bare arms.
His helmet was a piece of leather and there was no seatbelt. When drivers were asked if they don’t want to wear seatbelts, since it had been proven that seatbelts reduce the risk of injuries in a rollover, they responded that they would rather be found death then being trapped in a burning car. Jackie steward was one of the first drivers who really cared about his own safety. He was the first to wear seatbelts, demanded a high and sturdy roll bar and wore fire resistant clothing.
Other safety factors which have been tackled may not seem that obvious but surely made a difference. For example, the use of safety hubs, which are designed to keep the wheel on the car. Another important thing is track safety, while big run-off areas and sandboxes may seem to make a track more boring, they do have a significant effect for the safety of the drivers and spectators. We see this also in the competition, focus is on safety and there are a large amount of marshals. Driver briefings are held every morning and are mandatory.
Where do you think some improvements still can be made? What if increased safety makes boring races?
source: http://www.fiainstitute.com/Pages/homepage.aspx
The BMW i3, they call it electric and electrifying. It is so much more than just an electrical car. It is a revolution in terms of materials, production, and vehicle integration. Of course, carbon fiber plays another major role in weight reduction. These CFRP (carbon-fibre reinforced plastic) used for the life & drive-body structure (monocoque) of the i3 and i8, is
made in Moses Lake in the U.S. Moses, where they use energy generated out of hydropower. The BMW factory in Leipzig obtains its electricity entirely from wind power. Here the carbon pressing plant, plastic parts manufacturing facility, body construction facility, assembly hall, and logistics hall have been built with an investment of some €400 million.
The interior of the car is characterized by the use of high-quality, sustainable materials.
Natural materials like leather, wood and wool are used to strengthen the character of the i3. Other materials are obtained from recycling and can be recycled all over again. Natural resources such as KENAF fibers are used in the door panels. KENAF is a member of the 
hibiscus family (Hibiscus cannabinus L), it is related to cotton and okra, and grows well in many parts of the U.S. Kenaf grows quickly, reaching heights of 3.5-4.5 meters in as little as 4 to 5 months. This makes it perfect for use in mass production. The leather used in the interior is tanned with a natural tanning agent derived from olive leaves and protects the leather in a natural way. Also certified eucalyptus wood from sustainable sources is used for the instrument panel. Eucalyptus wood is primarily planted in Europe and comes from 100 % certified, responsible forestry management. The textile seat covers consist of nearly 100 % recycled polyester, which is manufactured from up to 34 % PET. The other textiles used in the interior such as headliner, floor, floor mats or the luggage compartment trim are also produced sustainably.
I have ridden with the BMW i3 on the Motor Show in Brussels and it was a real pleasure. It feels great driving such a car while knowing that it is completely emission-free. When the battery technology is more evolved I would certainly buy a car like this.
Sources:
http://www.bmw.be/nl/new-vehicles/bmw-i/i3/2013/start.html
http://articles.sae.org/12056/
Extensive safety in today’s automobile industry is one of the more attractive selling points. Where speed and acceleration where the initial attractor, nowadays cars need to be safe and efficient. With some reports of Tesla’s model S catching fire, people are getting demotivated to buy Electric cars because the flagship of the EV’s is getting a little to hot for a non-combustion car. To counter-act this trend, Tesla had released a minor update to the Model S’s safety features. The Aluminium Deflector Plates are to prevent unfortunate impacts in the underbody to start a fire. With some impressive shots of how things are crushed while driving over them, my personal affection for the model S, hasn’t really changed, because I’ve always wanted one. Tesla also writes that there ceramic firewall would keep those people in those burning cars safe, but would you stay in your car when it’s on fire? I wouldn’t.
Check out this carbon fiber bench by Peter Donders.
In one of my previous blogs i talked about carbon fiber in you daily life. Well, I wished i had this bench in my daily life. The Belgian designer Peter Donders designed some random shapes in a CAD program that look rather blobby. After creating this `mold-blob` he started wrapping bundles of impregnated carbon fiber around the shape, paying attention to the points where most of the stress culminates. After the curing process he removed his mold and voila, you have your strange spider-webby couch in which you don’t want anything to fall out of you pockets. Again, this couch is way to expensive, but I could imagine myself having fun with carbon fiber and some weird shapes to make my own, how hard could it be?
Source:http://www.fastcodesign.com/1662469/carbon-fiber-scribbles-you-can-sit-on
13 September 2014 is a date to write down in your agenda’s. It’s the start of a brand new motorsport series, the formula E. This new breed of racing should be the pinnacle of electric racing and it sure is an example for the Formula GroupT racing team. The cars are all the same and are being build with parts from various F1 manufacturers. Batteries from Williams, motor and transmission from Mclaren and a carbon chassis made by Dallara.
The cars will race only on street circuits in cities and they will accelerate from 0 – 100 on about 3 seconds, which is as fast as the new car of Formula GroupT. One major difference with formula 1, besides that the cars will run only on electricity is that at a pitstop, the drivers will run 100m to another car, to continue the race with a fully charged battery pack.
The goal of this new series is to speed up the evolution of electric powered vehicles and to show that green racing can be sexy. Let’s hope one day these awesome performance can be found in street cars! But is there a place for electric racing, besides the big circus of F1? Will it be popular enough?
In the last few years there is a new development of carbon fiber. The so called carbon nanotubes. Carbon nanotubes potentially have very high mechanical properties. With a modulus higher than 1 TPa and strength of 10 to 60 GPa, these fibers are a lot stronger than carbon fibers (230 GPa and 3,5 GPa). Nanotubes are tube-shaped and about one ten-thousandth of the thickness of a human hair. The structure looks like a rolled-up chicken wire with a continuous unbroken hexagonal mesh. See pictures below. Their lengths are typically several microns but with the help of a new technique they can extend these fibers to a few centimeters. Production of these nanotubes is done by growing them on substrates. It is the same technique used to grow bacteria.
Although nanotubes are stronger than carbon fibers, they have a big disadvantage when used as reinforcement for composites. Because their structure is not as compact as the layered graphite layers in carbon fiber, it is impossible to achieve a high fiber volume fraction. This means you will have a tube with resin inside and not a fiber with resin around it. They are also completely hydrophobic, so they will have a low adhesion with polymer matrices. It is possible to use it in a composite but it will have a lower strength than when using normal carbon fiber. The only reason to use these nanotubes in a composite is due to their high thermal and electrical conductivity. These properties are comparable to other conductive materials.
Sources:
Advanced Material technology course http://www.nanocyl.com/en/CNT-Expertise-Centre/Carbon-Nanotubes
Recycling in a composite world has become an obvious achilles heel. Not only the production of carbon fiber fabrics is a quit expensive process or any fabrics in the composite industry for that matter, but on the other hand, the re-use, recycling or waste-methods for composites are also quit pricey, definitely if you would like to compare this industry on a bigger scale with the steel-industry. Thinking about my previous blog, we know that there are multiple ways to re-use/recycle a dry carbon fiber. Although if often means one can only yield short fibers, there is definitely an industry for this type of material. And although I usually only consider the situation for carbon, the same can often be applied for its alternative fabrics: Kevlar, Glass, Bio-fibers,…
The Holy Grail of this achilles heel would be to find a solution to the disposal or recycling of the resins used in the composites. These, highly chemical compounds are often melted or dissolved out of its composite to gain the dry fibers, but one wonders how these resin are converted to ,worst-case, bio-friendly substances or ,best-case, in newly useable resources. Definitely don’t forget the energy needed to produce the different substances of this chemical breakdown and the energy needed to contain these reactions.
I’ve come across multiple resins that claim to be `recyclable`, so it’s great to see efforts in technology in this direction. I wonder though, if the recyclability of these products already reaches the recyclability of steel.
It’s important to note that one should always compare the cost and energy of these recycling opportunities with the energy gained from incinerating these composites, because a lot of composites do have a great yield in energy if you burn them, and this often proves to be the most efficient way of handeling these products even though governments don’t acknowledge this fact and usually ban or restrict this methods.
Source:http://composite.about.com/od/Industry/a/Recycling-Composite-Materials.htm
Carbon Fibre Monocoque 