Photolithography for composites manufacturing: Continuous glass fiber/polyacrylate composites

The development of a novel technique for the manufacturing of composite materials by photolithography is described. Composite samples comprised of a photosensitive acrylate resin as the matrix and continuous glass fibers as the reinforcement were prepared in a Stereolithography apparatus to demonstrate the feasibility of the process. Experimental results indicate that the tensile strength increases from about 50 MPa for the pure resin to 120 MPa for a unidirectional composite containing 8 vol% fibers whereas a 0/90/0 laminate containing 10 vol% fibers displayed a strength of 160 MPa. The experimentally observed values for the composite strength were lower than the composite model predictions. However, the tensile strength of these samples indicates a definite improvement over the resin properties with the addition of the reinforcing fibers.