Self-reinforced polymer composites processing techniques

Fig. 3 Consolidation of a self-reinforced polymer composite from a stacked arrangement of fibres dark grey reinforcement phase) and polymer films light grey matrix phase). The fibres are shown normal to the plane of the page, and many layers can be stacked with a suitable number of film plies between layers a). On the application of heat and pressure the polymer films soften and flow between the fibres. Upon cooling, these films become the matrix phase of the composite, while the fibres withstand processing without significant degradation of mechanical properties, and so remain as the reinforcement phase of the composite b). The technique is equally applicable to any planar arrangement of fibres such as woven fabrics and random fibre mats...

Gong et al. later presented a means to create self-reinforced polymer composites based on nylon 6 without the use of separate additional nylon 6 films [186]. The authors reported the polymerisation of s-caprolactam into nylon 6 in situ, i.e. directly polymerising nylon 6 around woven nylon 6 fabric, in a process similar to the resin infusion technique used for the infusion of conventimial composites (such as glass fibre-reinforced thermoset polymer matrices). 

---