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Scientia Silvae Sinicae ›› 2021, Vol. 57 ›› Issue (9): 168-180.doi: 10.11707/j.1001-7488.20210917

• Review • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Application Progress of Plant Fiber/Thermoplastic Polymer Prepreg in Automotive Lightweight Field

Cuicui Wang,Mingpeng Li,Ge Wang,Shaohua Gu,Haitao Cheng*   

  1. International Centre for Bamboo and Rattan Beijing 100102
  • Received:2020-06-12 Online:2021-09-25 Published:2021-11-29
  • Contact: Haitao Cheng

Abstract:

Plant fibers as a macro material have the advantages of being a low cost abundant natural resource with a low density, high specific strength and high specific modulus, which is considered as the biodegradable renewable resource with the most promising research prospects. Plant fiber reinforced composite has a high use value and environmental protection without pollution, which not only significantly reduces the use of fossil fuels, but also reduces the greenhouse gas emissions, leading to huge market value and development prospects. Therefore, how to efficiently utilize the plant fiber resource, develop high-added value practical products and broaden the application fields have become key focuses of research and industry. Under the trend of automobile lightweight, substituting plant fiber for glass fiber and other reinforced composite materials will not only reduce the production cost and processing energy consumption, but also facilitate the construction of green, circular and low-carbon life system for auto parts products, effectively promoting the sustainable development of automobile industry. Prepreg, as an intermediate of advanced composite products, plays an important role in the development of automotive lightweight. Thus this study provides a brief overview of necessity of the continuous fiber reinforced thermoplastic polymer research; the preparation technology of continuous plant fiber as well as the continuous fiber/thermoplastic polymer prepregs commonly used in regards to the advantages, disadvantages and key technical problems. This review will expound upon the emerging technology of continuous plant fiber/thermoplastic polymer prepreg such as melt impregnation, extrusion-rolling, film stacking technique and fused deposition modeling. This paper also summarizes the application of continuous plant fiber/thermoplastic polymer composite materials used in automotive lightweight field, and analyzes the quality and production cost of automobile traditional and thin-walled door trim, as well as traditional and thin-walled bumper, in order to provide theoretical support for continuous plant fiber/thermoplastic prepreg for using in lightweight vehicles components. Finally, the research trend of continuous plant fiber/thermoplastic polymer prepreg is prospected. The future work will be focused on the preparation technology and evenly dispersed of continuous plant fiber, helping development of thinner prepreg, which thereby eliminates fiber buckling, improves the structure design, and further reduces the product cost. In order to achieve the stable production of continuous plant fiber/thermoplastic prepreg with lower porosity, improved quality and excellent performances, the existing preparation technology can be effectively combined so as to foster the strengths and circumvent the weaknesses, but also by combining the theory and practice further to develop the new manufacturing equipment and improve the production technology, so that the integrated development of material, equipment and process technology is expected to happen. At the same time, in order to promote the benign development of continuous plant fiber/thermoplastic prepreg, it is necessary to speed up the establishment of standardized evaluation system to regulate the market.

Key words: plant fiber, thermoplastic polymer, prepreg, preparation technology, automobile, lightweight

CLC Number: