Air Entrapment Prediction in Composite Manufacturing

Rotorcraft are highly engineered systems designed to perform missions in extreme locations around the world. To accommodate harsh environments and non-trivial cyclical loading conditions, components are commonly fabricated using advanced materials including composites. Dynamic load bearing thick laminate components are particularly challenging to produce due to the potential for entrapped air to be present within a fully cured component. A proof-of-concept model was developed to predict entrapped air and out-gassing. Thermo-chemical and flow-compaction finite element analyses were completed using a combination of commercial-off-the-shelf software and a custom proof-of-concept model developed by Convergent Manufacturing Technologies, Inc. Predicted results were compared against defects observed within laminated composites fabricated in a laboratory environment. Initial finite element predictions agreed moderately well with entrapped air observations.