Original Article

Journal of Reinforced Plastics

and Composites

Investigation of peel resistance 2016, Vol. 35(4) 275–286

! The Author(s) 2015
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DOI: 10.1177/0731684415613634
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S Rao, R Umer, J Thomas and W J Cantwell

Abstract
In this study, the influence of compaction load, layup speed and temperature on the adhesive properties of automated
fibre placement grade towpreg has been investigated on the ply-tool interface where higher peel forces are required to
permit the deposition of subsequent plies. The automated layup process was simulated on a CNC milling machine, using
a roller assembly and the adhesion properties of the towpreg were determined using a floating roller peel test. The
processing window for the towpreg was determined using a dynamic mechanical analyser and a two-level, full factorial
design of experiments was developed for the three factors, to understand their effects on the peeling force, both
individually and synergistically. The design of experiments analysis indicates a strong temperature effect, with the
towpregs requiring a higher layup temperature to accommodate higher layup speeds. A strong load-temperature inter-
action was detected, with a negative temperature effect at lower loads and a strong positive temperature effect at higher
loads. The predicted factor settings to achieve a peeling force of 246 N/m are, 1 kN compaction load, 65 C layup
temperature, and a layup speed of 120 mm/min. Experimental tests, carried out at the predicted factor settings, agree
well with the analysis, yielding a peel force of 256 N/m with a standard deviation of 25 N/m.

Keywords
Automated fibre placement, peel test, adhesion, tack, characterisation

offered by AFP technology for applications in civil

Introduction
The automated fibre placement (AFP) technology is
gaining importance in the aerospace industry because
of its ability to lay-up tailored laminates with a high
precision. AFP systems were commercially introduced
towards the end of the 1980s, being described as a
logical combination of automated tape lay-up (ATL)
and filament winding (FW).1,2 Several modifications
to the ATL technique, such as the roller stiffness,
material guides, controlled speed of lay-up, compac-
tion loads, temperature, and tape tension have been
made to improve the AFP process. Particular issues
such as, reliability, productivity, and lay-up accuracy,
associated with early AFP studies, have now been
resolved and current AFP machines are able to
achieve lay-up speeds of up to 80 m/min and reduce
wastage by up to 62%, compared with filament wind-
ing and manual lay-up technologies.3 Given that
future aircraft are likely to contain more than 50%
by weight of advanced composites, the potential
aviation is highly promising.
Contributing to the advancement in materials
research, dry and pre-impregnated slit fibre tows have
emerged as alternative materials for low-cost out of
autoclave (OOA) manufacturing.4–6 Though the prin-
ciples of the deposition process have remained
somewhat similar to the ATL,7 the narrower widths
of the tape make it easier to control around contoured
surfaces, which in effect reduces material wastage.
However, during deposition, for the material to
remain in place without slipping, it must have good
Aerospace Research and Innovation Centre, Khalifa University of Science
Technology and Research (KUSTAR), Abu Dhabi, UAE
Corresponding author:
S Rao, Aerospace Research and Innovation Centre, Khalifa University of
Science Technology and Research (KUSTAR), Abu Dhabi 127788, UAE.
Email: sanjeev.rao@kustar.ac.ae
276
adhesive properties, commonly referred to as tack. In
general, the tack levels should be sufficient to hold the
prepreg on to the mould surface and to subsequent plies
without slipping, but low enough to be repositioned in
case of any misalignment. In operation, prepregs or
towpregs are usually heated to make it tackier and pli-
able, to conform to the tool geometry. The tack levels
at room temperature are usually provided by the manu-
facturer,8 however, information on tackiness at other
temperatures frequently has to be determined by the
part manufacturer. Commonly, in a routine production
cycle, the lay-up temperature is held constant9,10 or, less
commonly, varied linearly according to the feed rate.11
Problems arising with tack during operation are fre-
quently tackled by experimenting with the process par-
ameters, lay-up temperature, lay-up speed and
compaction load. Though it may solve the issue tem-
porarily, such trial and error methods are time consum-
ing and lead to material wastage. Therefore, it is
important to have knowledge of the process and mater-
ial parameters prior to planning an AFP schedule.
Information regarding the processing and material
parameters are available in literature, for example,
Lukaszewicz et al.3,12 have reported the void content
after lay-up is dependent on lay-up speed, temperature
and pressure. Crossley et al.8,13 reported that tack levels
are sensitive to both the lay-up speed and the tempera-
ture of the lay-up, Calawa and Nancarrow14 reported
similar results mentioning that a lay-up temperature of
35 C should be ideal for most epoxy prepreg materials.
Complementary observations have been made by Ahn
et al.,15 who reported that the tack of an uncured pre-
preg reaches a maximum at 20–25 C above the instant-
aneous glass transition temperature of the resin.
Gutowski16 reported that the tack is better at lower
feed rates, recommending the machine to be operated
at slow speed when starting a new ply. In a recent
study, Rao et al.17 suggested a temperature of 65 C to
be optimum when using out-of-autoclave (OOA) tow-
preg tapes employed in the fiber placement processes.
Several test methods to determine tack levels of
adhesives are available, of which, the floating roller
peel test involving peeling off a flexible adhesive strip
from a rigid adherend is commonly used. As the vari-
ation in thicknesses of the adherends influences the test
values, it is usually limited to 1.63 mm with the speci-
men thickness not exceeding 0.63 mm.18 Another
common test used in the pressure sensitive adhesive
(PSA) industry to characterise tack is the probe
test,19–21 which consists of a probe coming in contact
with the material. The force and/or energy of separ-
ation is measured and the stress is defined based on
the area of the probe surface.8 Several modes of failure
are frequently observed, occurring in the bulk or at the
surface, by crack formation and propagation.15
Journal of Reinforced Plastics and Composites 35(4)
However, in the case of prepregs, probe tests have
been found to be sensitive to changes in surface
roughness that are caused by fibre architecture and
resin distribution within the specimen.20 Therefore,
this test method may be less suitable for prepreg tack
characterisation. In a relatively recent study, Crossley
et al.8 have proposed a new method to determine tack
levels, specifically for automated lay-up processes. The
specifications of the peeling stage are similar to the
floating roller peel test as per standard ASTM
D3167,21 but additionally the initial stiffness offered
during peeling off the backing tape is taken into
account.
Taken together from literature, the tack levels for
fibre lay-up operations depend primarily on lay-up par-
ameters, such as the lay-up speed, temperature and
compaction load, and any variation in these factors
will affect the tack properties of the prepreg.
Developing universal models to optimise tack proper-
ties, considering all these factors, may be difficult due to
inherent variability in the characteristics of the pre-
pregs.3 Therefore, each of these factors has been mod-
elled separately. For example, Tierney and Gillespie22
developed a model to predict through-thickness heat
transfer and bond strength, based on intimate contact
and healing at the ply interface, Lichtinger et al.23
developed a parameterised 3D Finite Element model
for the precise prediction of the thermal history
during the complete layup process, Hörmann et al.24
investigated how the position and orientation of infra-
red emitters, relative to the substrate, influence the
material temperature and subsequently developed a
numerical heat transfer model as a function of the pos-
ition, orientation and power density of the emitter.
Though literature regarding the influence of varying
individual process parameters on the fibre placement
process is available, few address their synergistic inter-
action on the overall lay-up optimisation. Pitchumani
et al.25 examined the product quality by varying ther-
mal degradation, void content, and dimensional
changes during the process and identified a window
for tape placement to obtain optimum quality. Aized
and Shirinzadeh26 used response surface methods to
identify key influencing parameters in determining the
quality of thermoplastic composite prepregs and
reported layup temperature to be the key factor.
Grouve et al.27 have investigated the interrelation
between process parameters, material properties and
inter-laminar bond strength is using laser assisted tape
placement process for thermoplastic tapes and have
demonstrated that an excellent bond quality can be
achieved at higher velocities and low input power
using mandrel peel tests.
Here, in order to evaluate the influence of factor
effects on the tack properties of OOA prepregs during
Rao et al.
the fibre placement process, a factorial Design of
Experiments (DoE) approach using orthogonal arrays
is used. The statistical DoE provides the possibility to
vary all the factors systematically in an orthogonal
array, allowing for the estimation of average effects,
without the results being distorted by other factor
effects. This has with the effect that all the trials are
unique and do not repeat. The physical mechanisms
(e.g. heat transfer, squeeze flow, adhesion) have not
investigated in this work and will be reported in subse-
quent work.
Experimental procedure
An in-house fibre placement system was designed and
built that consisted of a roller and a 20 kN load cell,
(Omegadyne LCM202) housed between the roller and
the tool arbour of a BridgeportÕ milling machine,
Figure 1(a). The layup temperature, just before the
compaction on the flat tool was monitored using an
infrared camera, Fluke-A SC and a hot air gun from
BoschÕ was used as the heat source, Figure 1(b). As
emissivity affects the temperature measurements, the
emissivity factor, the IR camera was calibrated within
the test environment at 65 C by constantly adjusting
the emissivity factor in the camera software to match
that of the k-type thermocouple and a pre-calibrated
Fluke 566 laser temperature gun. An emissivity factor
of 0.50 provided the closest match to the thermocouple
and laser temperature gun readings with a variation of
1 C. Therefore, a value of 0.50 was chosen as an
emissivity factor in this work. Furthermore, timely
monitoring of temperature was carried out using
Fluke 566 laser temperature gun to check for any
deviations.
Figure 1. (a) Fibre placement roller head (b) experiment set-up.
277
For the peel tests, the tapes were laid on flat alumi-
num strips as per ASTM D3167 standard.21 The alu-
minum strips were cleaned using acetone and Frekote
700-NC mould release agent from Henkel was applied
before layup. The aluminum strips were fastened to a
flat mould using double-sided tape sticking tape and
four towpregs were laid during one course. The milling
machine software, MastercamÕ X7 from CNC
Software Inc., was used to define the tool path, simu-
lating the fibre deposition rate in the AFP process.
The displacement of the roller assembly, to achieve
the required compaction load, was obtained in a separ-
ate experiment with similar setup except that the dis-
placement was recorded for 0.5 and 1 kN. This value of
displacement was inputted into the software as a con-
stant depth of cut over the length of the layup. The
distance of the air gun from the tape, and its settings,
were also obtained from experiments with similar setup.
A metal ruler was placed and the distance from the tip
of the heat gun and the roller was recorded until the
temperature of the tape reached 65 C for the whole
length of the aluminum strip. After series of trials, a
temperature setting of 110 C and a distance of 75 mm
provided a uniform 65 C at 120 mm/min; however, for
20 mm/min the temperature setting on the heat gun had
to be set to 75 C but at the same distance. The carbon
fibre OOA towpreg CYCOMÕ 5320-1 was supplied by
CYTEC Engineered Materials Inc. USA. The nominal
width of the tape was 6.35 mm5 and the thickness was
0.275 mm. The nominal fibre areal weight is 145 gsm
and the nominal resin content is 33% by weight. The
prepreg spool was thawed overnight and conditioned
for 2 h at room temperature before the lay-up oper-
ation. Details of the processing conditions for the
tape can be found in Ref. 5.
278 Journal of Reinforced Plastics and Composites 35(4)

Table 1. Factors and their respective codes considered in this

Material characterisation study.
Peel test. Floating roller peel test, per standard ASTM
Acronym Representation
D3167,21 was used to determine the peel resistance of the
towpregs on an Instron universal testing machine, with a L Compaction load (N/m)
5 kN load cell. The calibration results prior experimen- S Layup speed mm/min
tation show a maximum error at 125 N to be 0.05% T Temperature ( C)
(0.0625 N) with a repeatability of 0.05%. A peel rate of LS L and S interaction
152 mm/min was used and the force displacement data LT L and T interaction
were recorded using BluehillTM software. The average ST S and T interaction
peel force was measured over a peel distance of 75 mm.
y1-8 Response value
As the width of the tape started to increase at 1.5 kN
y Average response value (grand average)
compaction load and 120 C by 0.5% of the initial
width, to 15% at 3 kN and 120 C, a maximum load LS,LT,ST Interaction factor response
lower than 1.5 kN has to be chosen to reduce its influ- y max Maximum average response value
ence on the normalized peel force.

DMA tests. To determine the processing window,

dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA) experiments
were carried out on the towpregs under a constant Table 2. Factors and their respective levels.
strain control mode in a single cantilever set-up, using
Level
a DMA8000 from Perkin Elmer. The DMA continu-
ously measures force (F), displacement (D) and phase Factors 1 2
angle () between the stress and strain vectors during
tests. The storage modulus E0 , loss modulus E00 is cal- Compaction load L (kN) 0.5 1.0
culated using following equation28 Lay-up seed S (mm/min) 20 120
Temperature T ( C) 25 65
l3 F
E0 ¼ g sin 
wt3 D ð1Þ
l3 F
E00 ¼ 3 g sin  Table 3. Coded design matrix with factors at their respective
wt D levels.
where l is the sample length, w, t are the width, thick- Factor Response
ness of the sample, respectively, and g is the gravita-
tional constant. In this study, unidirectional towpreg of Trial L S T y (N/m)
8 mm length, 6.35 mm width and 0.275 mm thickness y1 1 1 1 118
were used. A single cantilever arrangement was y2 1 1 2 180
chosen since it generates data that are closer to the
y3 1 2 1 150
actual mechanical properties of the composite parts
y4 1 2 2 199
during curing.28,29
Aluminum foils were used to wrap the ends of the y5 2 1 1 131
unidirectional towpreg to prevent it from squeezing and y6 2 1 2 215
slipping during the test. The DMA device was then y7 2 2 1 107
switched between five frequencies; 1, 3.33, 10, 16.6, y8 2 2 2 256
and 33.3 Hz continuously in a polling mode at a
strain amplitude of 0.05 m and temperatures between
25 C and 300 C. A compaction load of 1 kN, as suggested by
Lukaszewicz et al.,3,30 was chosen as a high level
value to lay down four towpregs in a single pass
Design of experiments (36 N/mm) and a value of 0.5 kN (20 N/mm), (this
Three factors, these being compaction load, lay-up being the lowest load required to tack the towpregs at
speed and lay-up temperature, with low and high set- room temperature) was used as the low level. Room
tings, were considered for this work. The factors and all temperature was chosen as a low level for the tempera-
the abbreviations used in the experiment are listed in ture factor, since the tack information at this level is
Table 1 and the factors levels in Table 2. provided by the manufacturer. A high level of 65 C was
Rao et al. 279

(a) 300 (b)

y1 y2 y3 y4
250 y5 y6 y7 y8

200
Peel force (N/m)

150

100

50

0
Trials from y1 -y 8

Figure 2. Peel test results (a) average peel force of all trials with their mean deviations (b) sample peel force traces of trails y5 - y8.

Figure 3. Storage modulus E0 , loss modulus E00 , tan  as function of temperature. Measuring frequency of 1 Hz and temperature ramp
of 5 C/min.

chosen following DMA tests and a previous study.17
Due to temperature setting limitations on the heat
gun, 120 mm/min and 20 mm/min were chosen as high
and low levels of the layup speed. Though the param-
eters chosen are specific to the AFP simulator used in
this work, it is envisaged that the essence of factor influ-
ences on the peel load will remain the same in an indus-
try setting.
This set-up leads to a typical two-level, three-factor
L8 layout, with eight trials to complete the entire
280 Journal of Reinforced Plastics and Composites 35(4)

Figure 4. Complex viscosity and tan  traces as function of temperature at measuring frequency of 1 Hz and temperature ramp of
5 C/min.

250

225 T2

200
Peel force (N/m)

S2 (LT) 2
L2 (LST) 2
(LS) 1 (ST) 2
175

(LS) 2
150 L1 (ST) 1 (LST) 1
S1 (LT) 1

125
T1

100

Figure 5. Main and interaction factor contributions to the peel force.

experimental work. Orthogonal array has been con- orthogonal array allows for the confident estimation
sidered for estimating the best material formulation of average effects, as the factors do not influence each
needed to obtain an optimum peeling force. As the fac- other. Moreover, all the trials undertaken in this array
tors are independent of each other, the use of are unique and do not repeat. A coded design matrix,
Rao et al.
with factors and responses at their respective levels, is
listed in Table 3.
Results and discussion
Peel tests
The average peel force values for all of the trials are
shown in Figure 2(a) and a sample of typical peel force
traces from trials y5 to y8 is shown in Figure 2(b).
A maximum peel force of 256 N/m was recorded in
trial y8, in which all the factors were set at their
higher levels, and the minimum of 107 N/m was rec-
orded in trial y7 when the factors were set at L2, S2
and T1. The average peel load values of specimens rec-
orded at other factor setting are listed in Table 3. As
this study concerned the first ply, where higher peel
forces are desired in order to sustain the deposition of
subsequent plies, peel force was chosen as the response
variable to analyse in this analysis.
Dynamic mechanical analyser
For practical purposes, a low viscosity promotes
adhesion by creating full contact at the joint surface
by spreading, under a squeezing force or compaction
load. However, for the adhesive’s resistance to separ-
ation to increase, the viscosity of the adhesive must
increase after the application of the compaction
force.30 Therefore, a low resin viscosity will facilitate
the rapid establishment of tack, but will result in a
lower bond strength. On the other hand, a high vis-
cosity serves to increase the bond strength, but at the
cost of greater difficulty in establishing tack.31
Therefore, practical adhesive systems require some
compromise on viscosity or require that the viscosity
of the adhesive change (increase) with time after
application.
Importantly, during the tacking procedure, the
viscoelastic nature of the resin affects the tack imme-
diately prior to the release of the compaction force.
As the viscosity of the matrix is both time and tem-
perature dependent, the tack exhibits both a time and
temperature dependency. In a recent study, Rao
et al.17 conducted stress relaxation experiments on
OOA towpregs at 25 , 45 and 65 C and have
showed that the relaxation of the material is faster
at 65 C, suggesting that this temperature is best
suited for the laying up process. This is evident in
Figures 3 and 4 as a peak in the tan  curve, along
with low complex viscosity values at about 58 C.
Therefore, 25 C and 65 C, i.e. the two extremes of
the temperatures considered in the previous work
have been used as the low and high level values for
the DoE in this work.
281
Table 4. Values used for calculation of LS interaction effect.
Observed Average
L S (N/m) Values (N/m) (N/m)
1 1 119 180 149
1 2 150 199 175
2 1 131 215 173
2 2 107 256 181
Design of experiments
Main factor effects. To examine the contribution of
each factor in terms of the overall peel resistance,
each factor is plotted on either side of the global aver-
age, this being the average value of all the trials, as
shown in Figure 5.
The main factors are represented as L, S and T, and
their interactions are represented as LS, LT and ST (see
Table 1 for the explanations of the nomenclature). If
the peel force is only a function of the main factors,
then the maximum attainable value should be the sum
of the overall average and the positive contributions of
the main factors. This can be expressed using following
equation
ymax ¼ y þ ðL contributionÞ þ ðS contributionÞ
ð2Þ
þ ðT contributionÞ
where ymax is the maximum attainable peel force value
and y is the global average, and the others are as
described in equation (2). The L, S and T factors con-
tribution in equation (2) is obtained by setting up a
factor response table,32 as listen in Table 8, in
Appendix 1. Figure 5 is then plotted with the global
average as the horizontal line and the factors contribu-
tion at their respective levels plotted on either side of
the horizontal line. The length of the connecting line
between two levels represents the amount that the
factor contributes to the overall average, when it is
changed from a low level to a high level.
Therefore, from Figure 5, it is evident that, by set-
ting all main factors to their higher levels, a higher peel
force can be expected (first three vertical lines).
However, considering indications from Figure 1 that
only main factors contribute and setting the factors to
their high levels (L2, S2 and T2) in equation (2), yields
229 N/m, which must correspond to the response value
(y8) in Table 3 where all the factors are at their higher
levels. However, it does not correspond to the value in
Table 3 (256 N/m), and this discrepancy between the
average values and actual values indicate a presence of
interaction between the factors.
282 Journal of Reinforced Plastics and Composites 35(4)

250
Interaction effects. In order to determine whether any of
the two particular processing parameters interact or
225 not, a graphical tool called interaction graphs was
used (Figures 6 to 8). If the lines in the interaction
Peel force (N/m)

200
plot are parallel, there is no interaction between the
L2 processing parameters, implying that the change in
175
the mean response, from a low to a high level of a
L1
150 factor, does not depend on the level of the other
factor. In contrast, if the lines are non-parallel, an inter-
125
action exists between the factors. The greater the degree
100 of departure from being parallel, the stronger the inter-
1 2 action effect between the two parameters. Interaction
Levels (S)
effects in this study were established by examining the
variation of each factor with respect to the mean or
Figure 6. LS interactions effect plot, L2 ¼ 1 kN, L1 ¼ 0.5 kN, average value and calculated as mentioned in
S1 ¼ 20 mm/min, S2 ¼ 120 mm/min. literature.32

LS interaction effect. The interaction of the compac-

tion load and the lay-up speed, Figure 6, shows a nega-
250 tive interaction between the two factors. At a higher
layup speed, the increase in load from 0.5 kN to 1 kN
225
L2 has little effect on the peel force, at a lower layup speed,
Peel force (N/m)

200 a higher compaction load yields higher peel force

values, Figure 6. However, the contribution of this
175 interaction in Figure 5 is small compared to the LT
L1 and ST interactions. Therefore, this interaction will
150
produce a minimal negative interaction effect of
125 8 N/m in the peel force when changed from L1S1 to
L2S2. All values used for calculation of LS interaction
100 effect are listed in Table 4.
1 2
Levels (T)
LT interaction effect. In Figure 7, an antagonistic

Figure 7. LT interaction plot L2 ¼ 1 kN, L1 ¼ 0.5 kN, T1 ¼ 25 C, interaction between L and T factors is clear, due to
T2 ¼ 65 C. the intersection of the compaction load and tempera-
ture response traces. Higher temperatures during layup
(T2) produce higher peel forces irrespective of the com-
paction load (0.5 or 1 kN). However, if lower tempera-
ture layup is preferred, a lower compaction load (L1)
favours higher peel load. It is interesting to note in
Figure 5 how much the lines deviate from each other
250
when passing from lower to higher temperatures. In
225
essence, as temperatures during layup increases from
S2 T1 to T2, an increment of 0.5 kN (to 1 kN from
Peel force (N/m)

200 0.5 kN) produces a considerable increment in peel

load values. This is because, the viscosity of matrix is
175 S1 lower at higher temperatures, and the action of spread-
150 ing is better achieved at a higher compaction load
(squeezing force). The contribution of this interaction
125 produces an effect of 30 N/m increase on the peel force
of the tape when load and temperature are changed
100
1 2 from L1T1 to L2T2. The values used for calculation of
Levels (T) LT interaction effect are listed in Table 5.

Figure 8. ST interaction plot S1 ¼ 20 mm/min, S2 ¼ 120 mm/ ST interaction effect. In Figure 8, a positive inter-
min, T1 ¼ 25 C, T2 ¼ 65 C. action is seen, with the force required to peel the tape
Rao et al. 283

off the rigid adherend increasing as the temperature changed from a lower level to a higher level. The
increases from T1 to T2. This interaction suggests that values of the interaction factors are listed in Table 6.
if higher deposition rate is required, the layup tempera- Considering interaction factors to estimate overall
ture must be increased accordingly (65 C for 120 mm/ peel force, results in the following equation
min in this case). The interaction is not as severe as the
LT interaction and the contribution of this interaction ymax ¼ y þ ðL contributionÞ þ ðS contributionÞ
produces a 13 N/m increase in the peel force when þ ðT contributionÞ þ ðLS contributionÞ
þ ðLT contributionÞ þ ðST contributionÞ
Table 5. Values used for calculation of LT interaction effect. þ ðLST interactionÞ
L T Observed Values Average
Peel force ¼ 169:65 þ 7:70L2 þ 8:49S2
1 1 118.50 150.10 134.30
þ 42:86T2  4:15ðLSÞ2 þ15:21ðLTÞ2 ð3Þ
1 2 180.12 199.08 189.60  
2 1 131.14 107.44 119.29 þ 6:52ðSTÞ2 þ9:68ðLSTÞ2
2 2 214.88 255.96 235.42
where LST is the three factor interaction estimated as
per literature.32
From Figures 5 to 8, it is evident that all factors
Table 6. Values used for calculation of ST interaction effect.
show some contribution to the overall peel force, and
S T Observed Values Average their significance can be determined using half-normal
plots.33 Less significant factors tend to manifest them-
1 1 118.50 131.14 124.82
selves as being near zero, displaying a normal distribu-
1 2 180.12 214.88 197.50
tion centered about the line passing through the origin,
2 1 150.10 107.44 128.77 while significant factors depart away from zero, having
2 2 199.08 255.96 227.52 a normal distribution centered about their respective
larger values.

Figure 9. Half-Normal plot depicting the importance of all the factors.

284 Journal of Reinforced Plastics and Composites 35(4)

Figure 10. Correlation of actual experimental results with predicted results.

Table 7. Error in the predicted and measured values considering only two-factor effects.

Factor
Experimental Predicted Absolute
Trial L S T (N/m) (N/m) error (%)

y1 1 1 1 118.5 128.2 8
y2 1 1 2 180.1 170.4 5
y3 1 2 1 150.1 140.4 6
y4 1 2 2 199.1 208.7 5
y5 2 1 1 131.1 121.5 7
y6 2 1 2 214.9 211.9 1
y7 2 2 1 107.4 117.1 9
y8 2 2 2 255.9 246.3 3

In Figure 9, it is clear that temperature plays an
important role, deviating significantly from the zero
line. This is followed by load-speed and speed-tem-
perature interaction factor effects. The interactions,
such as lay-up speed, load-temperature interaction
and the three-way interaction between the factors
follow a normal distribution, clustering around zero
and not contributing significantly to the overall peel
force. However, in the prediction of the peel force,
the lay-up speed factor ‘S’ must be considered, as it
is present in both the contributing interaction effects,
i.e. LS and ST. Therefore, including those factors in
predicting the peel force, using equation (3) results in
255 N/m.
Correlating the actual experimental results with the
predicted results, shown in Figure 10 and Table 7, it
is evident that the values predicted using equation (3)
are within 10% of the experimental data, with the
maximum error being 9% for trial y7 in Table 7,
when the compaction load, lay-up speed and lay-up
temperature factors are set at levels 2, 2 and 1,
respectively.
Rao et al.
Summary
In this study, the floating roller peel test has been used
to determine the peel force that is be required to sep-
arate a towpreg from a mould surface during the auto-
mated fibre placement process. The AFP procedure was
simulated using an in-house experimental rig and the
peel force required to separate the prepreg from the
mould was determined as per ASTM D3167. This
study has focused on the first ply where higher peel
forces are required to permit the deposition of subse-
quent plies. Therefore, a two-level, full factorial design
of experiments for the layup load, speed and tempera-
ture factors was setup to understand their effects on the
peeling force, both individually and synergistically.
Based on results of the DoE analysis, the layup tem-
perature has the greatest influence in determining the
resulting peel force. Significant antagonistic inter-
actions between the compaction load and temperature
indicate an application of compaction higher load on
the tapes that are deposited at 65 C. The load-speed
interaction effect is of least significance, followed by
the speed-temperature effect. In essence, the peel force
is virtually independent of load-speed and speed-
temperature factor interactions. For a faster layup
rate, it is suggested to set load and temperature factors
to 1 kN and 65 C, respectively, to yield a peel force of
246 N/m at 120 mm/min. Experimental tests carried out
at the predicted factor settings agree well with the ana-
lysis, a procedure that yielded a peel force of 256 N/m
with a standard deviation of 25 N/m.
Acknowledgements
The authors thank Mr Bittu Scaria and Mr Mohammed
Rashed Abdulla Alsuwaidi at Khalifa University for their
assistance in the experiments and the Department of
Aerospace Engineering for the use of equipment.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with
respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this
article.
Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial sup-
port for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this
article: The authors are also grateful to Mubadala Aerospace
and the ARIC centre for funding this research project.
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Appendix – 1

Table 8. Factor response table.

Load Speed Temperature LS LT ST LST

1 2 1 2 25 60 1 2 1 2 1 2 1 2

118.50 118.50 118.50 118.50 118.50 118.50 118.50

180.12 180.12 180.12 180.12 180.12 180.12 180.12
150.10 150.10 150.10 150.10 150.10 150.10 150.10
199.08 199.08 199.08 199.08 199.08 199.08 199.08
131.14 131.14 131.14 131.14 131.14 131.14 131.14
214.88 214.88 214.88 214.88 214.88 214.88 214.88
107.44 107.44 107.44 107.44 107.44 107.44 107.44
255.96 255.96 255.96 255.96 255.96 255.96 255.96
161.95 177.36 161.16 178.15 126.80 212.51 173.80 165.51 154.45 184.86 163.14 176.17 159.98 179.33