Applications
Carbon fiber is a general term for fibers containing more than 90% carbon, named for their high carbon content. Carbon fiber has a variety of excellent properties of elemental carbon, such as small specific gravity, heat resistance, thermal shock resistance, chemical corrosion resistance and electrical conductivity, etc., but also has the fiber's windability and excellent mechanical properties. In particular, it has high specific strength and specific modulus, in the adiabatic conditions, can withstand high temperatures of 2000 ℃, is an important industrial fiber materials, suitable for reinforced composite materials, ablative materials and insulation materials. It is a new type of material developed in the early 1960s, and has now become an indispensable and novel material in modern society.
The earliest application of PAN carbon fiber in leisure products is fishing rods. Nowadays, the annual production of carbon fiber fishing rods in the world is about 12 million, which is equivalent to about 1,200 tons of carbon fiber usage. The application of carbon fiber in golf clubs was started in 1972, the annual production of carbon fiber golf clubs in the world is about 40 million, equivalent to 2,000 tons of carbon fiber. The application of tennis racket was started in 1974, the world's annual production of carbon fiber racket about 4.5 million, the need for carbon fiber dosage of about 500 tons. In other areas, carbon fiber is also widely used in skis, snow boats, ski poles, baseball bats, road races, and marine sporting goods.
People recognize the properties of carbon fiber such as lightweight, fatigue resistance and corrosion resistance, and thus began to be widely used in the aerospace industry. In the field of astronautics, high-modulus carbon fibers have long been used in artificial satellites and other applications due to their lightweight (rigidity), dimensional stability of thermal conductivity, and have begun to be used in communication satellites such as Iridium.
The modeling compound is mainly blended in the form of short fibers for use in thermoplastic resins, and can be widely used in household appliances, office machines, semiconductors, and their related fields due to its reinforcing, anti-static, and electromagnetic wave shielding effects.
Pressure vessels are mainly used in compression (CHG) tanks and air breathing apparatus for firefighters, including all tanks produced with CF filament winding. Other fuel containers, such as CNG tanks, are heavy if made of metal in the past, and must be lightweight in order to operate over longer distances. As a result, all-composite containers using metal with a fiber-wound or plastic liner are being used in practical production applications. Air respirators are recognized as CF products by the DOT in the U.S., and their market demand will grow dramatically in the future.
In recent years in the field of civil engineering and construction, rely on carbon fiber for seismic repair and reinforcement of the construction method, highway bridges, ground, beams, buildings and beams, frames, and smoke tubes and other bending reinforcement, the modulus of carbon fiber becomes particularly important.
The market demand for carbon fiber is growing in ferries, large speedboats, and other boat types.
The growth trend for carbon fiber is even stronger in energy and related fields, including wind turbine blades, fuel cell electrodes, flywheels, and other applications. Although the use of wind power generation has yet to be further promoted, these applications can give full play to the strengths of carbon fiber.
Carbon fiber applications, in addition to those involving previous X-ray medical devices, electronic devices and other related fields (except for rotating cylinders for enriched uranium), various mechanical parts, electrical parts, umbrella skeletons, helmets and other life-related items, as well as new items such as the frames of trucks, structural bodies of vehicles, refrigerated boxes, home elevators, and so on.