Overview of current design and analysis of potential theories for automated fibre placement mechanisms

Automated fibre placement(AFP) systems have successfully intensified the demand for high-quality composite component manufacturing in both the military and civilian fields. One of the main elements of these systems is the AFP mechanism for accomplishing individual fibre delivery,clamp/cut/restart(CCR) and the consolidation process, and it consists of several functional submechanisms presenting strong coupling relationships and motion sequences. This review aims to summarize the development of AFP mechanisms and the associated research achievements and provide insight into the research challenges in promoting innovative design in such mechanisms. The systematic development of AFP systems is reviewed in detail, and subsequently, engineering tendency and the general principle of AFP mechanisms are introduced. Focusing on the mechanism design of AFP sub-mechanisms, including the creel assembly CCR and compaction mechanisms,the mechanical schemes as well as the AFP process parameter control are discussed. To improve system reliability and fully optimise AFP mechanisms, the essential theoretical foundation for AFP mechanisms are provided. It is believed that this attempt will help to change the design and optimisation of similar complete mechanisms. Based on the reviewed research, overall remarks and perspectives are presented to serve as a guide for exploring the possibility of novel easy-to-use and cost-effective integrated AFP applications.

Uniform Coverage of Fibres over Open-contoured Freeform Structure Based on Arc-length Parameter

This article uses arc-length parameters for path planning to carry out robotic fibre placement （RFP） over open-contoured structures This allows representing the initial path and offset points using an identical mathematical equation and computation by more simple arithmetic. With the help of classical differential geometry, the calculation of fiber-placing paths may be reduced to solution of initial-value problems of first-order ordinary differential equations in the parametric domain （parametrically defined mould surface） or in 3D space （an implicitly defined mould surface）, thereby significantly improving on the existing methods. Compared with the conventional methods, the proposed method, besides its computational simplicity, has a better error control mechanism in computing the initial path and offset points. Numerical experiments are also carried out to demonstrate the feasibility of the new method in composite forming processes and also its potential application in computer numerical control （CNC） machining, surface trim, and other industrial practices.