AdditiveCARBON – Hybridization of 3D printing with carbon fibers

Additive manufacturing permits almost unlimited freedom of design – a characteristic that allows innovative design methods, especially for lightweight solutions. However, the material properties are so far not comparable to the high load-bearing capacities of carbon fiber composites. CFRP plays its strengths when the load acts preferentially along the fiber direction. AdditiveCARBON allows the realization of hybrid structures by means of a combinated and fully automated manufacturing approach in which the carbon fiber reinforcement directly follows the load paths and the additive base structure serves as support for compressive loading.

So far, in additive manufacturing a larger building volume leads to higher production costs and longer production times. In typical composites production, in turn, tooling costs, inefficient material utilization and waste lead to high overall costs. AdditiveCARBON is here to eliminate the limitations of both technologies by means of a targeted hybridization: the carbon fiber reinforcement reduces the necessary building volume of the 3D printing part and the additively manufactured base structure makes a separate tool unnecessary for the robot-supported 3D-winding process. A symbiosis, which has a positive impact not least on the cost side.