A study of post-processing for AFP-fabricated thermoplastic composites with void content and air permeability characterization

Improving the quality of fiber-reinforced composite laminates using out-of-autoclave techniques has been a challenge for a long time. The recent trends toward the replacement of autoclave processes with out-of-autoclave processes for thermoplastic composites still lack a compressive recipe. This study first develops an understanding of the integrated effect of the automated fiber placement (AFP) lay-up process parameters (compaction force and lay-up velocity) and the type of post-processing: i) autoclave and ii) vacuum bag only (VBO) processing with two vacuum hold times, 2 and 24 h. The void content results highlight the potential of the VBO process to replace the autoclave with an improved void content of VBO with 24 vacuum hold times. Then, this result has been correlated with the morphology of voids after the AFP lay-up as isolated or connected via air permeability characterization. This study reveals that the high air permeability to effective porosity ratio of samples after AFP lay-up which is achievable with low compaction force facilitates the air removal mechanism during the VBO process with sufficient vacuum hold times.