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Composite Materials Possible Substitutes For Traditional Materials

Composite materials were developed to meet special mechanical requirements for industries like aeronautics and automotive. They offer advantages over traditional materials like high strength to weight ratio, corrosion resistance, and lower production costs. Composite materials are made by combining different materials, such as plastics reinforced with fibers, to improve properties. Their use is increasing due to environmental benefits and ability to meet demanding performance needs in applications.

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Bugiac Florina
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49 views2 pages

Composite Materials Possible Substitutes For Traditional Materials

Composite materials were developed to meet special mechanical requirements for industries like aeronautics and automotive. They offer advantages over traditional materials like high strength to weight ratio, corrosion resistance, and lower production costs. Composite materials are made by combining different materials, such as plastics reinforced with fibers, to improve properties. Their use is increasing due to environmental benefits and ability to meet demanding performance needs in applications.

Uploaded by

Bugiac Florina
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Lesson 1-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

1. Composite materials possible substitutes for traditional materials


1. Why composite materials ?

Composite materials have been used long before their definition as a particular group of materials.
At first, the wood was used, then the stone and then approx. 100 years ago a revolutionary material
appeared in the construction industry: concrete.
Over the past 70 years, the technique has evolved greatly, so it was imperative to produce materials
with special mechanical properties.
The emergence and development of new areas such as aeronautics, automotive, and mainly the
development of military applications has forced the development of this category of materials that
can work under severe conditions. For example, in the aeronautical industry the aerodynamic
considerations of profile optimization and the special conditions imposed due to temperature
differences, fatigue strength, stiffness, vibrations, etc. are considered as the priority aeronautical
industry.
As a result, the traditional materials can not fully satisfy the imposed restrictions, and the
complicated configuration of the structures implies, from the point of view of the economic factor,
the use of different technologies of realization, which requires expensive technique or the
realization of some materials easy to get what means cheaper technology. From the point of view of
the economic factor, composite materials have emerged, representing a new class of materials of
great technological importance and whose applications are currently very intensive in many fields.
Composite materials belong to the category of materials designed to meet the special requirements
of:
- High mechanical strength and stiffness.
- Corrosion resistance.
- Resistance to chemical agents.
- Low weight
- Dimensional stability
- Resistance to variable and shock demands.
- Resistance to wear
- Insulating properties.
- Aesthetics
The main advantage of these materials is the high ratio between resistance and bulk density and the
low cost of obtaining complicated elements in large series and mass production.
These advantages have ensured their very large use of these materials, but have stimulated the
research for the realization of composite materials with special properties.
Another important factor for which these materials are increasingly used is that of global
environmental policy. Therefore, classical materials used, such as meat, will be increasingly
expensive to produce due to their implications for ozone, residual water, etc. Composite materials
have the advantage of achieving them without an environmental impact.
One study estimates a consumption of composite materials of 2400 x 106 to, compared to 2800 x
106 to. metal for 2010. Japan's composite materials production amounted to about $ 3 billion in
2002, thanks to the development of the automotive industry.
From a scientific point of view, composite materials have imposed a new way of approaching
resistance calculations to determine elastic characteristics that differ from one material to another.
A structure that has composite materials will have to be studied both in terms of bearing capacity,
damage that may occur in the load, and behavior under difficult working conditions (temperature
variations, vibrations, chemical agents, etc.).
These issues have recently made research into this category of materials more and more profound,
with more and more possibilities for use being discovered.
A material in this category was reported in the 1800s, and was called gum-elastc. It was used by
Malaysians to produce household utensils and handicrafts. At the bottom of the gum-elastic there is
Lesson 1-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
a plant material called gutta-percha soaked in hot water and hand-processed or tilting the pouring
technique.
The first large-scale synthetic material was cellulite in 1853. The celluloid is made by dissolving
cellulose products in nitric acid.
Practically the development of plastics was the starting point for the appearance of composite
materials.
From the chronological point of view, since 1909, the main discoveries in the field of plastics are
presented in Table 1.

Table1 – Composite materials development


Since 1909
1820 The first synthetic rubber plant
1839 Goodyear introduces the rubber vulcanization process
1845 Bewlwy gets gutaperca
1847 Berzelius realizes the first polyester
1859 Butlerove fabrics formaldehyde polymers
1866 Berthlot synthesizes styrene
1870 Hyatt patented celluloid
1872 Hyatt patented the first plastic injection machine
1878 Hyatt develops the multi-nest mold injection process
1894 Cross and Bevan are patenting the first cellulose acetate production line
1909 Bakeland captures phenolic resins

However, plastics have a number of disadvantages compared to materials such as metal, wood or
ceramic materials, such as:
- Little stiffness.
- Low resistance.
- Low temperature resistance.
- They're flammable.
- They are expensive.
In view of these considerations, it has been found that the properties of plastics improve greatly
when armed with different metallic or non-metallic materials.

Conclusions
- Composite materials have emerged as a necessity, due to the emergence of new fields -
arronaut, shipbuilding, automotive industry, military technique.
- Their development was due to research in the field of plastics.
- The economic criterion is the one that dictates the realization of new composite materials.
- They are materials that are produced by technologies with little impact on the environment.
- Most of them can be recycled.

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