posted on 2019-12-19, 10:47authored byAthanasios Pouchias, Paul CunninghamPaul Cunningham, Jasmin Stein, Mihalis Kazilas
The analysis and design of a novel flexible dielectric sensor, which can be integrated into a composite materials manufacturing process to measure the resin frontal flow, is presented in this paper. The proposed sensor consists of two parallel line electrodes and a ground plane covered by a dielectric material. The analytical description and the electrostatic modelling were considered for the design of the sensor and to enhance the understanding of the response of the sensor to the resin impregnation of a carbon fabric during the infusion phase. The optimization of the sensor’s response and the increase of its sensitivity with regards to the geometric characteristics and the materials used were the main objectives of this study. An experimental set-up for the vacuum infusion process which includes the proposed sensor was used to measure the capacitance and validate the derived resin flow against visual measurements. The results indicate that the sensor can provide information on the resin frontal flow within 2% accuracy against visual measurements, which make this technology promising for monitoring the liquid resin infusion processes.
Funding
EPSRC CDT-EI under the grant number EP/L014998/1
Clean Sky 2 Joint Undertaking under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 686493.
History
School
Aeronautical, Automotive, Chemical and Materials Engineering
This is an Open Access Article. It is published by MDPI under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Unported Licence (CC BY). Full details of this licence are available at: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/