Preform process water slurry

Another approach is slurry molding and this technique was firstly used to manufacture carbon-carbon composites by Besmann et al. (2003). This process mixes phenolic resin with carbon fillers in water to create slurry which is fed out and vacuum molded into a preform. A second process called carbon chemical vapor infiltration (CVl) is then used to seal the plate for gas impermeability and for improvement of electrical conductivity. This process has been further developed by Huang et al. (2005) to reduce the cost caused by the CVl process and by Cunningham et al. (2007) to improve the properties of the bipolar plates. However, the mechanical properties of the bipolar plates were not found to be as high as the solely wet-lay-based plates (see Figures 6.7 and 6.8). 

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