Data Acquisition and Monitoring for Thermoplastic Components Produced using AFP

Standard thermoplastic manufacturing methods, such as autoclave and hot-press production, provide minimal spatially-resolved information on process parameters incident on the workpiece. In contrast, the localised, additive nature of automated fibre placement can provide a much higher resolution database for temperature values by utilising an appropriate acquisition and analysis tool. Such a tool has been developed at the German Aerospace Center (DLR), allowing researchers to optimise laser-heating control parameters, predict and reduce the total waste material volume, and provide 3D spatially-resolved information for comparison with non-destructive testing analysis in the post manufacturing stage.