Design of Hard Compaction Rollers for Automated Fiber Placement on Complex Mandrel Geometries

This paper presents a methodology for designing hard compaction rollers for an AFP (automated fiber placement) head with a hot gas torch heating system for laying thermoplastic CFRP (carbon fiber reinforced plastic) tapes. Some manufacturing defects and alternative designs are reviewed to highlight the importance of AFP compaction roller conformity and surface adhesion. The formulation of a general parametric description of the design challenge is derived and adequately addresses the problem on a tow-to-tow basis.