Abstract:

At present， the composites with short or long fibers as reinforcement have been widely used in automotive non⁃load⁃bearing parts. If the composites need to be further developed for the application in automotive main or secondary load⁃bearing parts， it is necessary to use continuous carbon fiber to improve their product strength and stiffness. However， in the forming process of continuous fiber⁃reinforced composites， the small elongation at break of carbon fiber makes it easy to cause molding defects such as fiber fracture， wrinkling， and tearing in the position of the large curvature. To solve this problem， the influence of the starting point and initial orientation of fiber laying on the overlay effect was analyzed theoretically through the simulation method of continuous fiber⁃reinforced composite laying with mold. To reduce fiber forming defects， the structural and overlay optimization design of continuous carbon⁃fiber reinforced B⁃pillar reinforced plate were carried out， and the geometry of B⁃pillar reinforced plate and the method of laying prepreg for the hot⁃pressing process were determined. Through the optimization of segmented overlay， the proportion of the unqualified layer at 0 °， 90 °， 45 °， and -45 ° was reduced from 45.18 %， 52.83 %， 72.21 %， and 71.78 % to 2.47 %， 3.45 %， 5.31 %， and 4.77 %， respectively. This indicated that the segmented overlay could effectively improve the lamination performance of the continuous carbon fiber. Based on the optimized overlay design， the B⁃pillar reinforced plate that meets the performance requirements has been successfully trial produced.

Key words: B?pillar reinforced plate, continuous fiber, structure optimization, overlaying simulation, composite