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What is Carbon Fiber?

Carbon Fiber is a polymer and is sometimes known as graphite fiber. It is a very strong material that is also very lightweight. Carbon fiber is five-times stronger than steel and twice as stiff. Though carbon fiber is stronger and stiffer than steel, it is lighter than steel; making it the ideal manufacturing material for many parts.

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Advantages Of Carbon Fiber

High Tensile Strength And Stiffness
The strength of carbon fiber comes from the reinforcing fibers: thousands of microscopic strands of bonded carbon which by themselves are strong in tension, but lack stiffness and resistance to compression. By suspending them inside epoxy resin (a strong and lightweight plastic) they become stiff along their axis and strong in both tension and compression.

Lightweight
Speaking of weight, carbon fiber is light! A carbon fiber reinforced plastic isn’t much heavier than a non-reinforced plastic. When compared to steel, the overall weight reduction is about ninety percent. A 70 pound steel car hood can be re-created to weight a mere 7 pounds! It’s lighter than aluminum and even titanium. The soon-to-be-released Polestar One sports-car developed by Volvo, for example, saves over 500 pounds with strategic use of carbon fiber, while at the same time improving stiffness in key areas. CF’s carbon fiber sunglasses are so light they only weigh 20 grams; that’s equivalent to just six pennies!

Suitable For A Variety Of Uses
In addition to its extensive use in the high-end automotive world, carbon fiber is being applied in almost every field you can imagine. Hikers love its lightweight properties in backpacks and tents and drones, planes, and helicopters can significantly improve their power-to-weight ratios.

Doesn’T Rust
Most materials react poorly to air and water, corroding, oxidizing, or simply breaking down unless protected. Not carbon fiber. Both the carbon and the epoxy resin are extremely stable and non-reactive, even when submerged in water! Ideal as a replacement for steel under conditions of extreme moisture or even submersion. There’s no need for expensive anti-corrosion treatments or continual re-painting.

Transparent To X-Rays
Despite being stronger than steel, carbon fiber is totally transparent to x-rays. The medical applications for this are boundless, as no other material combines the strength of metal with the x-ray transparency of plastic.

Won’T Bend Or Change Shape In Hot Weather
By using a high-temperature epoxy resin carbon fiber can be made to withstand extreme heat and cold with essentially no warping or change in size. This is due to carbon fiber’s property of low thermal expansion. Musicians have long dreamt of a guitar, harp, or violin that never go out of tune. Carbon fiber is bringing that dream to life, building musical instruments that don’t expand or contract when exposed to heat, cold, and humidity. Now instruments can survive exposure to the elements, rough handling, travel, and more, all while weighing less and offering decades of service.

Resistant To Chemicals
Carbon fiber (in its rigid form) is typically used in unison with a polymer matrix. Most commonly carbon fiber is paired with an epoxy resin system. Epoxy is formed from a two-part chemical reaction of a resin and a hardener. Once cured, epoxy is a thermoset that will not melt or return to its former constituents. This makes for a highly chemical resistant plastic that will not corrode, dissolve, or melt over time.

Good Heat Conductor
At the atomic level, carbon fiber is composed of the same material that forms charcoal—carbon. Due to a property know as thermal conductivity, heat is readily conducted along the length of the fibers. Carbon fibers have a thermal conductivity of about 500 W/mK (watts per meter-kelvin), compared with about 200.

Flexibility And Malleability
Prior to the lay-up process carbon fiber can be conformed to nearly any shape, although significant experience and technical know-how is required to adapt the process and material to various geometries. That’s not where it ends though. Composites can be made to be either flexible or stiff, but not both.

Visual Appearance And Aesthetics
If there’s one attribute nearly everyone knows about carbon fiber, it’s the instantly recognizable look. From the aggressive shark-tooth pattern, the depth, and the way it catches the light, carbon fiber can’t be missed!

Advance Applications of Carbon Fiber?

Aerospace Industry
The aerospace industry is used to describe everything from small drones to commercial airliners and satellites. The most important property of carbon fiber for this industry, as with many, is its weight. The use of lightweight material in the construction of commercial airliners saves companies millions in fuel every year for each aircraft. The use of carbon fiber in aircraft today has reduced the weight of some aircraft by up to 20%. Carbon fiber is mostly used in structures such as the fuselage, empennage, nose cones, and rotor blades. The drawback of using carbon fiber in aircraft is Barely Visible Impact Damage (BVID). BVID is damage that can barely be seen if at all by an unaided eye and is a very common damage type in all composites. This is a significant problem as unseen damage can compromise the safety of a component. Detecting BVID is very hard and requires extensive training and testing.

Sporting Goods
Carbon fiber is used in a range of sporting equipment to reduce weight while retaining strength. It can be found in tennis rackets, skis, snowboards, bikes, and golf clubs. The sports industry has exploited carbon fiber's light weight to be able to make faster-moving equipment. Because of the reduced weight of a bike using carbon fiber, cyclists are able to cycle much faster than before. The biggest problem with carbon fiber in sporting goods is that it's the most expensive material.

Medical Devices
Carbon fiber is used both for X-ray devices and implants in the medical industry. Carbon fiber is used for top boards as part of X-ray equipment as it is radiolucent, meaning X-rays can pass through it easily without interruption. Carbon fiber is used for medical implants as it is wear-resistant, has a high strength-to-weight ratio, and has a comparable elastic modulus to bone. The drawback of using carbon fiber over metal for implants is that, unlike metals, carbon fiber is brittle and is more likely to shatter.

Energy Storage System
Research is being conducted in the hope of developing carbon fiber structural batteries. This would mean that the structure of a car, for example, could be made out of a carbon fiber cell. This technique would reduce the weight of an electric car, making it much more efficient. The drawback of this system currently is that any impact damage to a vehicle is much more likely to result in a vehicle being written off as the damage would be hard to assess and even harder to repair.

Civil Engineering
Carbon fiber is being used in civil engineering to build bridges and concrete structures. In civil applications, the light weight of carbon fiber, while preferential, is not the most important factor, but strength is. Carbon fiber is being used to reinforce concrete structures in which steel would usually be used. Depending on the steel and carbon fiber, carbon fiber is 5 to 10 times stronger than steel. Carbon fiber is also being used as part of the load-bearing structures of bridges. The biggest disadvantage of carbon fiber in civil engineering is that it’s much more expensive than the steel it usually replaces.

Marine Technology
The biggest uses of composites in the marine industry are in yachts and small boats. For decades, the hulls of yachts and dinghies have been made out of fiberglass because of its light weight and resistance to corrosion. The falling price of carbon fiber is a reason it is now being used in yachts. Carbon fiber is also used to build masts, booms, and keels. The strength, light weight, and fatigue resistance are all advantages being exploited by the marine industry. The big disadvantage of carbon fiber in marine applications is that damage is hard to detect, which causes a massive safety issue.

Military and Defense Technology
There are many uses for carbon fiber composites in the military and defense industry. The most notable examples include uses in drones, helicopters, jets, and transport aircraft as well as pilot helmets. The light weight and strength of carbon fiber allow for more fuel-efficient and better-performing aircraft. Pilot helmets are becoming increasingly complex and therefore heavier. Using carbon fiber reduces that weight which removes strain from the pilot. The drawback of using carbon fiber in military aircraft is that damage is extremely difficult to detect and fix.

How is Carbon Fiber Made?

Stabilizing

Before the fibers are carbonized, they need to be chemically altered to convert their linear atomic bonding to a more thermally stable ladder bonding. This is accomplished by heating the fibers in air to about 390-590° F (200-300° C) for 30-120 minutes. This causes the fibers to pick up oxygen molecules from the air and rearrange their atomic bonding pattern.

Carbonizing

Once the fibers are stabilized, they are heated to a temperature of about 1,830-5,500° F (1,000-3,000° C) for several minutes in a furnace filled with a gas mixture that does not contain oxygen. The lack of oxygen prevents the fibers from burning in the very high temperatures. The gas pressure inside the furnace is kept higher than the outside air pressure and the points where the fibers enter and exit the furnace are sealed to keep oxygen from entering.

Treating the surface

After carbonizing, the fibers have a surface that does not bond well with the epoxies and other materials used in composite materials. To give the fibers better bonding properties, their surface is slightly oxidized. The addition of oxygen atoms to the surface provides better chemical bonding properties and also etches and roughens the surface for better mechanical bonding properties. Oxidation can be achieved by immersing the fibers in various gases such as air, carbon dioxide, or ozone; or in various liquids such as sodium hypochlorite or nitric acid. The fibers can also be coated electrolytically by making the fibers the positive terminal in a bath filled with various electrically conductive materials. The surface treatment process must be carefully controlled to avoid forming tiny surface defects, such as pits, which could cause fiber failure.

Sizing

After the surface treatment, the fibers are coated to protect them from damage during winding or weaving. This process is called sizing. Coating materials are chosen to be compatible with the adhesive used to form composite materials. Typical coating materials include epoxy, polyester, nylon, urethane, and others.

Carbon fiber manufacturing process

The manufacturing process is as follows:

Spinning

PAN mixed with other ingredients and spun into fibers, which are washed and stretched.

Stabilizing

Chemical alteration to stabilize bonding.

Carbonizing

Stabilized fibers heated to a very high temperature to form tightly bonded carbon crystals.

Treating the surface

The surface of fibers is oxidized to improve bonding properties.

Sizing

fibers are coated and wound onto bobbins. These are then loaded onto spinning machines that twist the fibers into different size yarns.

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FAQ

Q: What are carbon fibers used for?

A: Carbon fiber-reinforced materials are used to make aircraft and spacecraft parts, racing car bodies, golf club shafts, bicycle frames, fishing rods, automobile springs, sailboat masts, and many other components where light weight and high strength are needed.

Q: Is carbon fiber expensive?

A: The manufacturing process of carbon fiber is complex and involves several intricate steps, contributing significantly to its high cost. The process begins with the conversion of a precursor material, usually polyacrylonitrile (PAN) or pitch, into carbon fibers through a series of heating and stretching processes.

Q: Is there a better material than carbon fiber?

A: That said, Kevlar offers a better abrasive strength than carbon fiber, which is why it commonly associated with bulletproof vests. Kevlar is also better in extreme temperatures than carbon fiber, which some indicate make it better suited in the marine industry.

Q: What destroys carbon fiber?

A: They become discolored and brittle with UV exposure and can even crack or crumble. This is known as UV degradation and it is a real challenge for synthetic materials producers. UV light can also damage the epoxy that binds carbon fiber products.

Q: Why can't carbon fiber be recycled?

A: Carbon fiber is not currently biodegradable. Because carbon fiber is a composite built to hold its strength and shape – most carbon fibers are difficult to recycle and repurpose – especially since they cannot be melted down and used to make new products or items.

Q: How do you dispose of carbon fiber?

A: Also carbon fibers in the airstream can cause shorting in electric flue gas filters in incinerators. Therefore if waste carbon fiber composite material cannot be recycled it is recommended to send to landfill.

Q: How long does it take for carbon fiber to decompose?

A: Carbon fiber, which atits most basic form is carbon graphite, will last virtually forever. The material is typically not biodegradable or photo-degradable.

Q: What is the lifespan of carbon fiber?

A: Carbon Fiber Road Bike Frame Life
It is said that carbon has a shorter life than aluminum, but if you have regular maintenance, it will last for about 10 years. Carbon is a material widely used in airplanes and is known to be durable.

Q: At what temperature does carbon fiber degrade?

A: 300 – 1000ºC
Engineering fibers lose strength (carbon, glass) and stiffness (carbon) at elevated temperatures in the range of 300 – 1000ºC due to growth of surface flaws and/or mass loss. The property degradation is time and temperature dependent. Possible kinetic models are investigated for E-glass and T700S carbon fibers.

Q: How flammable is carbon fiber?

A: Though Carbon Fiber is constituted of carbon which is flammable, the fiber itself dose not flare up even if ignited by flame of match or gas burners. If heated up higher than 400 degree C together with some fuel, the fiber slowly burns (oxidized) but stops burning right after the burning fuel is removed.

Q: How to tell if carbon fiber is real?

A: When light hits real carbon fiber, it creates a holographic effect. The light will hit individual fibers and create a rainbow-like appearance through the resin. If the product doesn't have this effect under sunlight, you're looking at a fake material.

Q: Is carbon fiber magnetic?

A: The carbon fiber is a paramagnetic material, and the epoxy matrix does not have magnetic properties. So, the achievement of the necessary magnetic properties is due to only magnetite particles.

Q: Does carbon fiber have a shelf life?

A: From the research i was just doing, pre-preg carbon fiber has a shelf life of 1-12 months (freezing buys you more time). i've seen shelf lives of impregnated CF from 1-10 years.

Q: What is the original color of carbon fiber?

A: Real carbon fiber only truly comes in one way, the standard black/grey weave that we're all used to seeing. You've seen things advertised as a colored carbon fiber, but that's not the real story.

Q: What hardens carbon fiber?

A: As mentioned earlier, carbon fiber starts out as a dry cloth, and it can only become a rigid part by being combined with a resin in the form of a composite material.

Q: Is carbon fiber harder than diamond?

A: Due to their hardness, diamonds have been used as cutting tools, and some may wonder if other materials such as carbon fiber may be a stronger option. Though incredibly strong, carbon fiber is not necessarily as hard as a diamond. This means it is simply suitable for different applications that a diamond would be.

Q: How durable is carbon fiber?

A: It is a very strong material that is also very lightweight. Carbon fiber is five-times stronger than steel and twice as stiff. Though carbon fiber is stronger and stiffer than steel, it is lighter than steel; making it the ideal manufacturing material for many parts.

Q: Is carbon fiber high maintenance?

A: High gloss carbon fiber may be low maintenance, but it's not maintenance-free. While you don't need to be an exotic material expert armed with an esoteric repertoire of specialty tools, you do need to care for your carbon fiber from time to time.

Q: What is carbon fiber not good for?

A: Under outside pressure, the fibers in the matrix take close to no load, while under tension they take a lot. That alone is the reason why carbon fiber composites are the least suited materials for submarines and submersibles.

Q: What are the risks of carbon fiber?

A: Carbon fiber doesn't pose a risk when in a dry fabric form or when cured in a resin matrix. Carbon fibers can become a fine dust released into the atmosphere during cutting, machining or mechanical finishing. These fibers may irritate the skin or mucous members, such as eyes and lungs.

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