How light are carbon fiber composites?

Carbon fiber material is a relatively unfamiliar emerging material for many people. Most people's impression of this material is that it is strong and light in weight. This material is often seen on aircraft, automobiles, missiles and other parts that require weight reduction.

Carbon fiber itself is a fiber tow, and it is often used in the form of woven cloth and resin composite to make carbon fiber products, so we mainly understand the quality concept of carbon fiber composite materials. The density range of carbon fiber filament is 1.5~2.0g/cm^3, which is much smaller than that of most metal materials. Even very light aluminum is twice as high as carbon fiber. Most of the resin matrix used by carbon fiber is lower in density than carbon fiber filament, so the weight of carbon fiber composite material has obvious advantages over metal materials. Compared with our common steel materials, carbon fiber composite materials are more than four times lighter.

Light weight is only one of the characteristics of carbon fiber composite materials, plastic materials can also achieve similar weight advantages. Another major feature of carbon fiber composite materials is high strength, which is mostly used as an upgraded replacement material for metal materials in the application field. The commonly used T300 carbon fiber has a single tensile strength that is four times higher than that of the steel commonly used in life, which is currently difficult to achieve with other materials of the same weight. In the fields of aerospace, automotive lightweighting, and sporting goods weight reduction, carbon fiber composite materials are all used to achieve it.

Taking the carbon fiber manipulator as an example, the carbon fiber composite manipulator has a total length of 930mm, a width of 150mm and a wall thickness of 5mm. The total weight of the entire manipulator is only 3.5kg. Compared with the aluminum alloy manipulator of the same size, the total weight of the carbon fiber manipulator is About 40% lighter.

With the improvement of the quality of life and the level of craftsmanship, carbon fiber composite materials, a high-quality material, will be used in more fields. High-grade, beautiful, light-weight and high-strength carbon fiber will cover all aspects of production and life.