Alternative CFRP surface treatments : for adhesive bonding replace manual grinding

After more than 30 years, manual grinding of carbon-fibre laminates after peel-ply removal is still state of the art for adhesive bonding in aerospace. For automated adhesive-bonding processes, alternative surface treatments are needed to keep a high, reproducible quality standard. This paper concentrates on the characterisation of different peel-ply fabrics and ply fabric treatments (release agents) as well as on the investigation of corona and atmospheric plasma treatment as alternatives to CFRP grinding.