The most common additive is silica, but other additives such as rubber and carbon nanotubes can be used. Carbon fiber is sometimes referred to as graphite- reinforced polymer or graphite fiber-reinforced polymer (GFRP is less common, as it clashes with glass-(fiber)-reinforced polymer).
|
|
In January 1989, Chiao joined the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, California, where he was involved in processing research for fabrication of filament-wound and thick-section aerospace composites. Chiao also developed and demonstrated a mechanistic cure model for graphite fiber and epoxy composite material (see Graphite-reinforced plastic). An instrument-rated pilot, Chiao has logged over 2500 flight hours in a variety of aircraft.
|
|
An important way of replacing a resource is by synthesis, for example, industrial diamonds and many kinds of graphite, although a certain kind of graphite could be almost replaced by a recycled product. Most graphite is synthetic, for example, graphite electrodes, graphite fiber, graphite shapes (machined or unmachined), and graphite powder. Another way of replacing or extending a resource is by recycling the material desired from scrap or waste.
|
|
MER lander petals opening (Courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech) The spacecraft lander is a protective shell that houses the rover, and together with the airbags, protects it from the forces of impact. The lander is a tetrahedron shape, whose sides open like petals. It is strong and light, and made of beams and sheets. The beams consist of layers of graphite fiber woven into a fabric that is lighter than aluminium and more rigid than steel.
|
|
When the sabot reaches the end of the barrel, the shock of hitting still air pulls the parts of the sabot away from the projectile, allowing the projectile to continue in flight. Modern sabots are made from high strength aluminum and graphite fiber reinforced epoxy. They are used primarily to fire long rods of very dense materials, such as tungsten heavy alloy and depleted uranium. (see for example the M829 series of anti- tank projectiles).
|
|
Induction welding uses a implant or susceptor that is placed at the weld interface and embedded with conductive material such as metal or carbon fibers. An induction coil is then place near the weld joint, which induces a current in embedded in the material used to generate heat. When welding carbon fiber, carbon and graphite fiber mats with higher electrical resistance are used to concentrate the heat at the weld interface. This has the ability to weld complex geometry structures with great weld strength.
|
|
The Tigress was made from composites, including graphite fiber. Its span was shorter than that used on the Lancair IV, mounted flaps and had a wing area of . The Tigress's wing used a McWilliams RXM5-217 airfoil at the wing root, transitioning to a NACA 64-212 at the wing tip, the same as employed on the Lancair IV. The aircraft had a typical empty weight of and a gross weight of , giving a useful load of . With full fuel of the payload for pilot, passengers and baggage was .
|
|
Interactive 3D model of MESSENGER The MESSENGER spacecraft was designed and built at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory. Science operations were managed by Sean Solomon as principal investigator, and mission operations were also conducted at JHU/APL. The MESSENGER bus measured tall, wide, and deep. The bus was primarily constructed with four graphite fiber / cyanate ester composite panels that supported the propellant tanks, the large velocity adjust (LVA) thruster, attitude monitors and correction thrusters, the antennas, the instrument pallet, and a large ceramic-cloth sunshade, measuring tall and wide, for passive thermal control.
|
|
Fabric made of woven carbon filaments Carbon fibers or carbon fibres (alternatively CF, graphite fiber or graphite fibre) are fibers about in diameter and composed mostly of carbon atoms. Carbon fibers have several advantages including high stiffness, high tensile strength, low weight, high chemical resistance, high temperature tolerance and low thermal expansion. These properties have made carbon fiber very popular in aerospace, civil engineering, military, and motorsports, along with other competition sports. However, they are relatively expensive when compared with similar fibers, such as glass fibers or plastic fibers.
|
|
The sabot, necessary to fill the bore of the cannon when firing a long, slender flight projectile, is parasitic weight that subtracts from the potential muzzle velocity of the entire projectile. Maintaining the in-bore structural integrity of such a long flight projectile under accelerations of tens of thousands of g's is not a trivial undertaking, and has brought the design of sabots from employing in the early 1980s readily available low cost, high strength aerospace-grade aluminums, such as 6061 and 6066-T6, to high strength and more expensive 7075-T6 aluminum, maraging steel, and experimental ultra-high strength 7090-T6 aluminum, to the current state-of-the-art and incredibly expensive graphite fiber reinforced plastics, in order to further reduce the parasitic sabot mass, that can be nearly half the launch mass of the entire projectile. The discarding sabot petals also travel at such a high muzzle velocity that, on separation, they may continue for many hundreds of metres at speeds that can be lethal to troops and damaging to light vehicles. For this reason, even in combat, tank gunners have to be aware of danger to nearby troops.
|
|