LOW-COST COMPOSITE TOOLING USING ADDITIVE MANUFACTURING FRONTALLY CURED MORPHOGENIC COMPOSITES

The shaping of composite structures using traditional tooling is typically costly in time, energy, and money. New concepts that reduce each of these are sought. We investigate a process called composite morphogenesis in which frontal polymerization is combined with continuous fiber tow printing to generate predictable 3D-shaped composite structures from 2D prints. Specifically, we combine frontally polymerizable catalyzed gels of polydicyclopentadiene (pDCPD) with continuous carbon fiber tows deposited by Continuous Fiber 3D (CF3D^®) printing. CF3D^® printing involves the in-situ infusion of low-viscosity reactive resins into dry fiber tows, deposition of the wetted tows via a robotic arm-mounted print head, partial snap curing via UV irradiation, and subsequent full thermal oven cure. Patterned CF3D^® preforms are placed in the pDCDP gel. Upon initiation of frontal polymerization, we see the rapid and autonomous emergence of predictable 3D shapes that are dependent on the direction of the front propagation, the sequence of initiation, and the pattern of the deposited tows. This stimulus-responsive method offers new routes to advanced manufacturing of 3D composites which can be used directly or can serve as rapid tooling on which other composites can be laid and cured. This paper discusses the potential of morphogenic composites for tooling that is rapidly fabricated, low cost, and uses low energy.