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a
Netherlands Institute for Metals Research, Mekelweg 2, 2628CD Delft, The Netherlands
b
Design and Production of Composite Structures, Faculty of Aerospace Engineering, Delft University of Technology, Kluyverweg 3,
2629HS Delft, The Netherlands
Received 6 July 2005; received in revised form 20 October 2005; accepted 20 October 2005
Abstract
This paper presents a comprehensive overview of the process of induction welding of thermoplastic composites. The main objective is
to provide a deeper insight into the nature of the induction welding process and to summarise the investigative effort that was put into it
by a large group of researchers. The main focus is put on the types of heat generation mechanisms during the induction heating process
and the parameters that govern the welding process (frequency, power, pressure, residence time), as well as on the secondary phenomena
that can influence the quality of the weld. An overview of the experimental procedure is also presented, with an emphasis on the exper-
imental set-up. Finally, a brief overview of the modelling of the heat generation mechanisms and the induction welding process is
presented.
Ó 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
1359-835X/$ - see front matter Ó 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.compositesa.2005.10.009
T.J. Ahmed et al. / Composites: Part A 37 (2006) 1638–1651 1639
2.1. Welding set-up derived according to the transformer law Iw = NcIc, where
subscripts w and c indicate the workpiece and coil respec-
The type of apparatus required to produce a fully work- tively and Nc is the number of coil windings. Following
ing set-up varies for different applications, but the equip- this, the generated energy in the workpiece, Ew is then
ment can easily be divided into four parts [13,15]. The given by Eq. 1 which relates the effects of the coil on the
first is the radio frequency (rf) power generator, which sup- workpiece.
plies the necessary current and voltage to the induction
Ew ¼ P w t ¼ I 2w Rw t ¼ N 2c I 2c Rw t ð1Þ
coil. The second is the heat station which includes the
induction coil and produces the magnetic field needed to In reality, there is not a 100% coupling efficiency between
heat the material. The third constituent is the composite the coil and workpiece since the coupling is through air,
workpiece material itself and finally, the fourth involves and ideally a reduction factor should be introduced into
the secondary equipment such as the water cooling system, Eq. 1 to reflect this. However, the coupling efficiency is a
which is discussed in detail in [11,16], and fixtures. complex factor that depends on many parameters such as
the coil–workpiece distance, the workpiece itself and the
2.1.1. Power source coil geometry. It is unknown how such factors may influ-
The power supply is extremely important and affects the ence heating efficiency quantitatively and this point has
reliability, maintainability, compactness, energy efficiency generally been avoided in previous studies. Instead, it is
and cost of the overall system [17]. Each of the systems uses accepted that the coil should be as close as possible to
an input power of 230 V or 340 V alternating current (ac) the workpiece for maximum coupling efficiency [20].
with a frequency of 50–60 Hz. The alternating input cur- The coil geometry also has a great influence on the heat
rent is changed into a direct current (dc) to create a more generated within the workpiece and the importance of the
controllable input, which is then changed back into the design has been discussed in [21,22]. It is possible to design
required output ac. The frequency, voltage and power of the induction coil such that the associated magnetic field is
the output ac is defined by the induction coil used in inter- focused onto the specific weld zone that needs to be heated.
action with the workpiece [11,18]. Finally, in order to oper- When designing the coil geometry several design consider-
ate at the coilÕs highest efficiency, the current is passed ations need to be taken into account in order to produce
through a load matching station. the most efficient and uniform heating effect:
Induction power sources come in two forms; solid state
or vacuum tube, and differ in the frequency range that can Due to the higher magnetic flux density near the coil, the
be produced. The older vacuum tube power source uses coil should be as close to the workpiece, and as fully
vacuum oscillator tubes for changing the dc to ac. These over the weld area as possible to assure maximum
types of oscillators are normally used for frequency ranges energy transfer [11,23]. The time for welding is also
between 200 kHz and 2 MHz and higher power ranges affected by the distance and doubling the workpiece–coil
above 10 kW but because of lower efficiency factors, separation has been found to increase welding time by
solid-state power supplies are preferred if available [11]. 300–400% [24].
The solid-state power source is capable of a frequency up The shape of the magnetic field is asymmetric due to the
to 1 MHz, are smaller than the vacuum tube power sources coil connections to the heat station fixtures. Hence the
and have a higher efficiency. Conversion efficiency factors resulting heating pattern of a symmetrical coil is dis-
of a solid-state power source are greater compared to that torted [20]. In addition, at the point of the coil connec-
for vacuum tube power sources [17], with 55–60% for a tion the magnetic field is weaker, which is caused by
vacuum tube compared to 85–95% for a solid state [19]. magnetic field cancellation of the two parallel connec-
tions [20].
2.1.2. Heat station The rest of the coil needs to be designed to prevent mag-
The heat station is the second segment of the induction netic field cancellation such that if at any point two
heating apparatus and uses a capacitor and a coil to heat lengths of the coil are running parallel to each other,
the workpiece. The design of the capacitor to match both the distance between them should be altered to prevent
the power output and the induction coil power require- field cancellations [16,20].
ments is described in detail elsewhere in [17,16]. When working with composites the frequencies used are
Energy is transferred to the workpiece through the higher than the frequencies used for heating metals.
induction coil. The energy transfer mechanism can be mod- Therefore the system has tendencies for overloading
elled using the transformer principle [20] where the induc- and arcing between coil passages [15].
tion coil can be seen as the transformerÕs primary coil
and the workpiece the transformerÕs secondary coil. In an For heating application on composites three different coil
ideal situation where there is a 100% coupling efficiency, types can be considered as shown in Fig. 2 [13]: a single
100% of the power provided by the coil is transferred turn coil, a solenoid coil and a pancake coil, and numerous
through air to the workpiece. In this case, the relation variations on these basic types. The single turn coil has a
between the induction coil and the workpiece can be magnetic field that is concentrated around its diameter
T.J. Ahmed et al. / Composites: Part A 37 (2006) 1638–1651 1641
Fig. 2. Basic coil shapes [10]. (a) Single turn, (b) solenoid and (c) pancake.
The formula shows that the output current, and conse-
quently power, depends on several factors, such as coil–
workpiece geometry, material properties and frequency.
and is therefore used in applications where circular areas To be more specific, the region of optimal efficiency is
are to be heated. The solenoid is effectively an enlarged sin- not only defined by the power source, but also by the work-
gle turn coil and is able to heat larger cylindrical areas that piece. Therefore for each different application different
are passed through its centre. Finally, the pancake coil is machine settings are used. Each of these parameters is a
able to heat large flat areas and can be used on either side non-linear function and in turn depend on other factors.
of a weld zone to give good localised heating. This was con-
firmed by Miller et al. [25,23] and Rudolf et al. [24] and was 2.1.4. Welding fixture
concluded that heating the weld from both sides is most The final part of the induction welding apparatus is the
effective for creating a uniform through-the-thickness heat- test environment itself and more specifically, the apparatus
ing zone. A uniform area of heat can be created with little where the workpiece is held. To avoid heating of the test
temperature variation in the width of the heated zone. equipment, it is important to avoid the use of magnetically
susceptible materials within the vicinity of the magnetic
2.1.3. Workpiece and load matching field [15]. In cases where this is not possible, sufficient cool-
The highest energy transfer between the workpiece and ing is necessary. It is also possible to create distance
the coil is achievable through the process of adjusting the between the fixtures and the coil such that the magnetic
three induction parameters, voltage, power and frequency field has little to no influence. For example, a concrete slab
in such a way that the induction coil will operate at its max- has been used to provide this distance between the surface
imum efficiency. This is the process of load matching. The on which the workpiece is placed and the coil [26]. In these
maximum efficiency of an induction coil lies at its resonant cases where the use of metal fixtures are unavoidable, the
frequency. In a normal induction process the induction coil concrete is also a sufficient an insulator that acts to insulate
and therefore its input characteristics are designed accord- between the workpiece and metallic fixtures underneath to
ing to the desired input of the workpiece. Consequently the avoid the metal heating up the workpiece. In this way,
output characteristics of the power source need to be uneven heating through the thickness is avoided. However,
matched to the induction coil. The circuit representation the surrounding area influenced by the magnetic coil is rel-
of the power source, heat station and workpiece is shown atively small and can be localised as will be described in
in Fig. 3. In this figure Rp is the resistance of the coil, Rs Section 3.
is the reflective resistance of the secondary eddy current In order to aid in the consolidation process, pressure
path in the workpiece to the primary circuit, XLp is the pri- needs to be applied. A number of methods have been
mary reactance of the work coil, XLs is the reactance of the established to provide continuous and discontinuous pres-
secondary eddy current path reflected to the primary circuit sure and two examples are shown in Fig. 4. In order for
and XLg is the reflective reactance of the secondary air gap
between the coil and the workpiece. This indicates that the
current in the power source is influenced by the workpiece
itself and the inductor.
continuous welding to take place, the workpieces must be rent produces its own magnetic field which is able to cancel
heated by induction first, after which, delamination occurs. the magnetic field in the deeper regions of the workpiece
In order to reconsolidate and remove voids, the weld [23]. This extent of cancellation depends on the size of
region is passed through pressure rollers. The consolidated the induced current at the surface nearest to the coil. The
structure is then allowed to cool under controlled condi- current can only move along electrically conductive paths,
tions [27]. There are a number of variations for continuous or the conductive fibres. In prepreg stacks lying perpendic-
induction welding but are all based on coil/pressure roller ular to each other, this means that the mirror image is more
combinations. rectangular in shape. Woven plies however, have been
Vacuum bagging moulding has been used as a discontin- found to produce a more similar image to the coil and this
uous method of applying pressure [28], which allows for a has been attributed to the high incidence of electrical
uniform distribution of pressure to be applied over the contact within the weave [23].
entire surface of the weld zone. However, this method is Three categories of heating mechanisms have been iden-
limited to thermoplastics with extremely low viscosity at tified, namely Joule loss, junction heating and hysteresis
elevated temperatures. loss. These mechanisms differ in where exactly the heating
takes place within the workpiece, and are summarised dia-
3. Heating process grammatically in Fig. 5. There have been differing views as
to which is the predominant mechanism, with junction
Heat is produced within the composite workpiece as a heating gaining the majority of attention. A number of
response to the magnetic field, but where and how the heat studies have used various surface temperature monitoring
is produced depends on the material properties. The mate- techniques and have found Joule loss to be a secondary
rial itself can act as the susceptor [12,23,25,27,30–32] and is mechanism [30,38,39]. However, it has recently been sug-
desirable because of the absence of a contaminating insert gested that the structure of the workpiece itself determines
from the bond line which can weaken the mechanical the nature of the heating mechanism that takes place [40].
strength of the bond [12]. Alternatively an insert can be
included at the weld [32–37] as heat can be generated and 3.1.1. Joule loss—fibre heating
concentrated within the weld zone, even when the adher- Fibre heating is the result of Joule losses due to the
ends are also magnetically susceptible. It is unclear in sus- inherent resistance of the fibres and is therefore dependent
ceptor versus susceptorless welds, as to which produces the on fibre length, resistivity and cross-sectional area. Mit-
better quality weld and consequently much research effort chang et al. [27] singled the fibre heating mechanism as
has been spent in this area. Furthermore, how the work- the primary source of heat. Using infra-red camera obser-
piece generates heat has been the source of much debate vations, negligible differences were found in the tempera-
over the past decade, and the arguments put forward for tures obtained between carbon fibre weave/PPS matrix
each theory is described in this section. and virgin carbon fibre woven fabric. This led to the con-
clusion that the matrix provided little contribution to heat-
3.1. Heating of fibre-reinforced thermoplastic composites ing and therefore fibre heating was prevalent. Similar
results have been found by Lin et al. [25]. However, for
As previously mentioned in Section 2, a conductive loop fibre heating to occur, it has also been found that there
needs to be present in order for eddy currents to be induced needs to be a very low contact resistance between perpen-
in the workpiece. Heat energy, E, is produced according to dicular fibres, which occurs when there is a very high inci-
Joules law, E = I2Rt where I is the current, R is the resis- dence of fibre contact [40].
tance and t is the time of exposure to the magnetic field.
The rate of heating is dependent on the frequency and 3.1.2. Junction heating–dielectric hysteresis heating
intensity of the eddy current and the electrical resistance, This first type of junction heating is based on the obser-
specific heat and magnetic permeability of the material vation that the fibres of the prepreg or preconsolidated
[11]. Miller et al. [23] have shown that the eddy currents laminates at the bond line are separated by very thin layers
induced in the workpiece form a global loop that is the mir- of matrix material. Upon the application of an alternating
ror image of the coil. A consequence of this is that the cur- electric field, a potential difference is created between the
Fig. 5. Induction heating mechanisms [45]. (a) Fibre heating, (b) dielectric hysteresis and (c) contact resistance.
T.J. Ahmed et al. / Composites: Part A 37 (2006) 1638–1651 1643
fibres, and a capacitor effect is created. Dielectric heating where contact resistance is higher. Weaves and knitted fab-
occurs due to the movement of charge and rotation of ric will show fibre heating dominance due to a larger area
the molecules between the fibres. The influence of the inter- of contact between the fibres and thus a lower contact resis-
sections on the heating behavior has been researched by tance. Moreover, the processing parameters can shift the
Fink et al. [30]. Dielectric heating can be modelled as a con- heating mechanism from junction heating to joule loss
ductive loop with a resistance and a capacitor placed in [40]. As the workpiece heats, the viscosity of the matrix
parallel. The resistance between the fibres can be calculated lowers and, upon the application of sufficient pressure,
by [40] squeeze-out of the matrix occurs. This results in higher
h fibre contact and fibre-dominated heating results [40].
Rdh ¼ ð3Þ
we0 kd 2f tan d
3.1.5. Hysteresis loss
where h is the distance between the fibres, e0 is the permit- The final heating process that can occur is due to hyster-
tivity of a vacuum, k and tan d are the dielectric constant esis losses within magnetic materials [11,12]. When a mag-
and the dissipation factor of the polymer respectively, netic material is exposed to the alternating magnetic field,
and df is the diameter of the fibre. From this, and from the magnetic dipoles of the material change to realign with
the support of developed models, Gillespie et al. [41] have the field. Hysteresis indicates that energy is needed to turn
concluded that to maximise the dielectric heating effect of around the small internal magnets of the material to align
cross ply or angle ply laminates, the ply thickness above with the alternating magnetic field, as shown in Fig. 6. As
and below the interface and the fibre volume fraction the magnetic dipoles rotate, they vibrate and energy is lost
should be maximised, and fibre diameter and interply resin in the form of heat due to friction. Of the composite fibres
thickness minimised. As further support to the dielectric that are currently used, none are magnetic and therefore
heating mechanism, Fink et al. [42] have observed that dif- hysteresis loss is not applicable. However, if a metallic sus-
ferent polymers heat to different degrees and this difference ceptor is introduced into the workpiece, hysteresis loss
is attributed to the dielectric properties of the polymers. becomes a source of heating.
This heating process only occurs up to the point of the
3.1.3. Junction heating–contact resistance heating Curie temperature of the magnetic material; the point at
The final heating mechanism arises when the incidence which the material becomes non-ferromagnetic. At this
of fibre-to-fibre contact is high. In the case of higher fibre point, the material can no longer generate heat and sustains
volume fraction angled plies, contact resistance heating its Curie temperature even when a higher magnetic field
may be dominant and depends on the contact resistance strength is applied [46]. In this way, good temperature
at the fibre junction and the voltage drop across it [40]. control of the weld can be maintained [46].
Squeeze flow of the matrix out of the laminate during con-
solidation and fibre waviness contributes to this incidence 3.2. Heating elements
[43]. As a result of the contact, there is a large temperature-
and pressure-dependent resistance at fibre junctions which In cases where the adherends are not magnetically sus-
generates heat [40]. Direct contact is not necessary for con- ceptible, or controlled and localised heating is necessary,
tact heating to occur, provided that the distance between heating elements are used as inserts in the weld. Two main
the fibres is small enough for electrons to pass through this types of heating elements are available for the process of
layer [43]. In order to test for this type of heating mecha- induction welding which are common to all types of electro-
nism, Yarlagadda et al. [39] applied an ac induction field magnetic welding, and come in the form of a powder or
and a dc voltage to unidirectional strips arranged as a mesh. Similarly with the fibre case, the prerequisites are that
square loop. Both cases produced effective heating at the they are susceptible to the effects of an electromagnetic field,
fibre junctions, thereby discounting frequency-dependent
dielectric hysteresis. In addition, it was found that uniform
intimate contact is necessary for more uniform heating of
the workpiece, identifying the importance of surface rough-
ness on the extent of contact heating [39,44].
have enough electrical resistance to produce heat and form inserts. Finally, depending on the area to be welded, there
a conductive closed-loop network. Therefore any electri- is also the importance of the effect of the weight penalty
cally conductive material can be used as a heating element structures where weight reduction is a premier design goal
[47]. The use of inserts as a magnetic susceptor has a few [49].
advantages over using the fibres themselves. Firstly, heat
can be provided exactly where is needed and thermal 3.2.1. A comparison of weld configurations
stress build-up is prevented in other areas of the workpiece The simplest way to compare a weld with a susceptor to
and assembly [13]. The susceptors may also be coated in one without is to use lap shear strength (LSS) data. LSS
resin which help to fill voids in the weld zone and also can data has most commonly been used in the literature as an
be a blend of two matrices in the case of joining dissimilar indicator of the quality of the weld. Table 1 displays the
thermoplastic materials. Finally, non-conductive fibres, strength values for various laminates, weld and workpiece
such as glass or aramid, are not excluded and can also be configurations obtained from previous studies. It should
welded. Many studies have focused on the use of metallic be indicated that bond strength depends on the weld
powder interdispersed in thermoplastic resin [13,15,46]. parameters, which will be described in Section 4, and mate-
Generally, the frequency needed to heat the weld with such rials used to produce the joint, accounting for the range of
inserts are up to one order of magnitude higher than fibre values listed. It is also possible that LSS data does not give
inserts and the more costly vacuum tube power source are a clear picture about the quality of the weld and for this
needed. reason, various studies have instead used a number of other
Metal meshes have emerged as effective susceptors tests such as double cantilever beam, fatigue and flexure
[33,35,47] but there are a few important parameters affect- [21,28,50,51]. Such research has found that induction weld-
ing the effectiveness of these inserts. For good bonding of ing produces comparable, if not better, joints in compari-
the mesh inserts to the adherends, sufficient resin must be son to oven-cured or bolted joints.
available and hence embedding the mesh in the required
polymer is necessary. Studies that have focused on metal 3.3. Edge effects
mesh susceptors have found problems with uniform heat-
ing of the composite laminate aggravated by the non-uni- One of the major issues associated with induction weld-
formity of the magnetic field generated by the induction ing is an effect arising from the geometry of the weld zone.
coil [48]. Yarlagadda et al. [48] went some way to solving This so-called edge effect results from a coilÕs proximity to
this by selectively removing segments of the mesh. How- an edge of the workpiece. As an example, if a simple circu-
ever, the insert could act as a contaminant, inducing stress lar pancake coil is considered, eddy currents induced in the
concentrations and residual stresses due to differences in workpiece create global current loops that are circular in
thermal expansion, and environmental degradation of nature. Fig. 7(i) shows the eddy current path produced
the weld [12]. Mahdi et al. [28] found that there was poor by such a coil and an example of the corresponding temper-
adhesion between the metal mesh insert and resin used. ature profile taken across line A–A, for a workpiece that is
Although not a largely significant loss in shear strength larger than the coil. At the edges, and especially at the cor-
was observed during lap shear testing, the effects of such ners, there is a large area for eddy currents to flow. This
poor adhesion under different loadings, such as fatigue results in lower current densities in these regions and less
cycles, could prove to be detrimental. This highlights the heat is generated, as shown by the lower temperature
importance of adequate surface preparation of such profiles at the edges of the workpiece [23].
Table 1
Comparison of lap shear strength values
Reference LSS (MPa) Laminate type Weld configuration
Border and Salas [12] 27 Carbon/PEEK No insert
Cogswell et al. [31] 31 Carbon/PEEK No insert
Schwartz [5] 38–48 Carbon/PEEK No insert
Mitschang [27] 30 Carbon/PPS No insert
van Wijngaarden [32] 25 Carbon/PPS No insert
Cogswell et al. [31] 36 Carbon/PEEK PEEK film insert
Border and Salas [12] 44 Carbon/PEEK PEEK film insert
Todd et al. [7] 33 Carbon/PEEK PEI/PEEK film
Williams et al. [37] 46 Carbon/PEEK Woven carbon fibre insert
Nagumo et al. [35] 17–22 Carbon/PEEK Metal mesh
Hodges et al. [33] 41–48 Carbon/PEEK Metal mesh and PEEK insert
Whitworth [51] 27 Carbon/PEKK PEKK film insert
van Wijngaarden [32] 18 Carbon/PPS Expanded metal foil
Suwanwatana et al. [46] 20 Glass/PPS Nickel/PSU film insert
van Wijngaarden [32] 10 Glass/PPS Expanded metal foil
T.J. Ahmed et al. / Composites: Part A 37 (2006) 1638–1651 1645
4.2. Power
workpiece are therefore heavily coupled and the generated 4.3. Pressure
power is defined by [24]
2 Appropriate pressure application is important for high
ð2pf lr H ðIÞAÞ
P¼ ð5Þ quality consolidation because it allows for good intimate
R contact. However, Rudolf et al. [26] found that there is a
where H(I) is the magnetic field intensity, which is depen- practical limit to the pressure that can be applied. The con-
dent on the current of the equipment, and A the cross-sec- tinuous welding of carbon fibre-reinforced thermoplastics
tional area of the conductive loop in the workpiece. The was investigated and found that a higher pressure resulted
amount of heat generated in the workpiece is also propor- in a lower quality of weld. This was attributed to increased
tional to the frequency squared. This means that when the squeeze-out of matrix at the weld and a compromise must
magnetic field intensity drops in distance from the coil to be met between adequate intimate contact and polymer
the workpiece, the drop in generated power can be com- squeeze-out. Poor pressure application can result in the
pensated by a rise in frequency. Fig. 11 displays the depen- following faults.
dence of heating time with input power and coil/workpiece
separation. 4.3.1. Voids
From a processing point of view, the starting point of The appearance of voids have a close relationship with
the energy needed to heat an ideally insulated conductive the deconsolidation of the matrix material and there are
workpiece of mass mw, can be the required temperature a number of reasons that are the cause. The release of elas-
rise, DT: tic energy as fibre bundles deform under pressure and heat,
E ¼ P w t ¼ mw cDT ð6Þ expansion of entrapped gas bubbles, collapsing of air pock-
ets, inserts and thermal stresses due to the removal of pres-
where c is the specific heat of the workpiece. However, due sure before cooling to below the required temperature, all
to efficiency losses between the coil and the workpiece the contribute to the production of voids [57]. For the entrap-
total power needed to be provided by the power source is ment of air bubbles, the surface roughness is an important
higher during the time of heating. parameter. To prevent voids it is important to strive for a
The power influences the heating time in general. For high surface smoothness and apply a high weld pressure to
welding applications to be valuable, short processing times, suppress the occurrence of voids [27]. The high pressure
thus heating times, are needed. However, as will be constraint can cause a contradiction with the low pressure
explained, this must be offset with the quality of the weld to avoid folds and flashes, described later. A further conse-
and hence a compromise must be met. When designing quence of the creation of voids is delamination. Most of the
the total system the heat time can be the starting point time delamination is a result of extreme deconsolidation. In
for calculating the required power, because the other this case relatively large air pockets appear in the matrix
parameters such as the resistivity and specific heat are material that will separate one layer from the other in the
related to the material and therefore vary within vast laminate and thus destroy the interaction between the
boundaries. layers.
4.3.2. Cracks where the quality of the weld improves with residence time
Rudolf et al. [26] reported cracks due to the high degree and temperature as Tg is reached and exceeded. This
of crystallization of the semi-finished product, which becomes the optimum time and temperature range for
resulted in strong shrinkage of the matrix material. These welding, and hence the optimum process window. Finally,
cracks occurred due to thermal stresses due to the thermal if temperature within the workpiece exceeds the maximum
expansion mismatch between the matrix and fibres. Crack welding temperature of the polymer, thermal degradation
prevention is possible through the control of pressure of the polymer and a consequent degradation of weld
through the cooling phase. The matrix is thus prevented strength results.
from expanding and shrinking. The pressure can then be
removed when a uniform temperature profile is reached 5. Modelling induction welding
and the temperature is well below the melt or glass transi-
tion temperature. Due to the complex structure of the composite materi-
als, the modelling effort was mainly focused on the heat
4.3.3. Folds and flashes generation mechanisms in the carbon fibre-reinforced com-
These faults are due to misalignment and poor applica- posite materials. Several concepts that covered virtually all
tion of pressure. When the pressure is unequally divided possible heat generation mechanisms were proposed,
over the weld zone it can force matrix material out the weld discussed and investigated.
at the sides, causing flashes, or it can result in the folding of Miller et al. [23,25] proposed Joule heating as a domi-
the laminate at the edge of the pressure device. The folding nant heating mechanism in preconsolidated carbon fibre-
can cause fibres to buckle. To prevent these flashes it is reinforced thermoplastic materials. They also introduced
important not to apply a very high welding pressure. Very and proved the existence of the global current loop
high pressure forces the matrix out of the welding zone [26]. (between the adjacent plies) as the major path of the
To prevent the folds it is important to have a very smooth induced current in the laminate. A theoretical model was
under surface, because when applying pressure an unequal developed that assumed near perfect electrical contact
plate can force a fold into the laminate. between crossed plies. The conclusions were that Joule
heating is the primary heat generation mechanism and that
4.4. Residence time electrical ply to ply transfer is either real, by arcing, or vir-
tual, by displacement currents (as in a capacitor). The
The residence time is the time of exposure of the work- model is limited to preconsolidated laminates and is not
piece to the induction field and has an influence on the applicable for cases when good electrical contact between
movement of polymer molecules across the weld interface. the ply fibres cannot be provided.
In general, allowing for a longer residence time results in a Fink et al. [30,38,58,42] proposed an alternative concept
higher quality of weld because more polymer chains are that indicates dielectric heating in the matrix region at the
given time to move across the weld interface [29,46]. If ply junctions as a dominant heat generation mechanism in
welding parameters frequency, power and pressure are con- laminates in which direct contact between the fibres from
sidered to be constant, three welding regimes can be estab- adjacent plies does not exist. Their major proposition states
lished relating to the residence time and resulting that the primary heating mechanism in multi-directional,
temperature; non-wetting, uniform fusion and degradation thermoplastic composites subjected to a transverse mag-
and are shown in Fig. 12. Insufficient weld times, and there- netic field alternating at less than 200 kHz is dielectric
fore low temperatures, result in insufficient wetting and losses in the polymer region between fibres in adjacent
weld strength is low. A period of uniform fusion follows, plies, which make up a conductive path of significant
dimension [38]. The theory was developed using a simple
idealized conductive loop, illustrated in Fig. 13, that con-
Fig. 12. Different welding regimes of thermoplastic composites [29]. Fig. 13. An idealized conductive loop in a [0, 90] cross-ply [38].
T.J. Ahmed et al. / Composites: Part A 37 (2006) 1638–1651 1649
sists of two parallel carbon fibres in one plane and two Yarlagadda et al. [39] considered contact heating at
more in an adjacent plane. A lengthy theoretical analysis fibre–fibre junctions as an important heating mechanism
of the dielectric heating produced an equation that pro- in case of unconsolidated prepreg stacks. Their study
vided a comparison between the local contribution of the showed that contact heating is indeed major heating mech-
Joule loss in the fibre, Pi, and the dielectric loss in the junc- anism in these cases. This statement was supported by a
tion, Wj. The comparison is given by taking the ratio of the comparative experiment performed on an unidirectional
two sources of heat [38]: loop connected to a 30 V dc power source and a loop
heated by an induction coil, both producing the same heat-
Wj
¼ 3:35 1013 h ð7Þ ing rates and temperature profiles. Several numerical mod-
Pi
els were developed based on this concept [39,40,59]. The
Eq. 7 clearly shows that the thickness of the junctions first one, a conductive loop network model [39] formulated
should be of order 1014 [m] for the Joule losses to be com- for two-ply heating predictions accounted only for Joule
parable to the losses in the polymer (an electrical break- heating in the fibres and junction heating, so a choice
down would be expected at that thickness), which between dielectric and contact heating mechanisms has to
supported the proposed theory that power loss through be made prior to the computation. Modelling the newly
dielectric heating in the polymer region of cross-over junc- proposed concept of contact heating produced good, satis-
tions is the dominating heat generation mechanism [38]. factory qualitative results. Later on, a couple of experimen-
Several theoretical models for unconsolidated laminates tal methodologies were developed for estimating the
were developed based on the concept of dielectric heating through-thickness contact resistance of the fibre materials
[30,38,58,42]. An extensive experimental study was per- [60,40] that were used as an input to induction heating
formed in order to verify the model data. The reported re- models. The next step was developing a unified modelling
sults agreed well with the model predictions [30] and approach in order to determine the dominating heat gener-
although in some cases the results could not provide a di- ation mechanisms for any type of composite system (differ-
rect proof of the proposed model [42], they strongly sup- ent fibre and matrix material and laminate configurations),
ported the concept of dielectric heating. The Joule as well as for different processing parameters [40]. This was
heating in the fibres was excluded by observing the heating provided by using a representative electrical circuit to
patterns, which showed substantial heating only at the describe the heating mechanisms and non-dimensional
points of ply overlap. At relatively smaller thicknesses of parameters for their comparison. The model accounted
the polymer region Joule heating through fibre–fibre con- for all three possible heat generation mechanisms, as it is
tact at the junctions was allowed for, but only as a possible schematically shown in Fig. 14. A comprehensive paramet-
contributing mechanism. Experiments with different resin ric study was performed that resulted in a design map that
materials interlayer showed significant difference in the can determine the expected dominant heating mechanism,
heating characteristics [42], discounting by that the theory given the composite system. The results further showed
of virtual charge displacement and further supporting the that for carbon fibre composite systems junction heating
proposal of dielectric losses in the polymer. Finally, dielec- effects mostly dominate compared to Joule fibre heating,
tric breakdown was dismissed by performing cycle tests although it was noted that the fibre architecture plays sig-
that showed no change in the heating rate between the first nificant role in determining the dominant mechanism
and later cycles [38,42]. (woven fabrics may in some cases show dominant fibre
Fig. 14. Schematic of the fibre heating and junction heating at each conductive loop of the cross-plied laminate [60].
1650 T.J. Ahmed et al. / Composites: Part A 37 (2006) 1638–1651
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