After Gutenberg

The body of the Volkswagen 250 MPG prototype was an unpainted, carbon-fiber composite shell.

Besides more efficient power trains and improved aerodynamics, another way that engineers are looking to reduce fuel consumption is by making transportation weigh less. Traditionally, passenger cars have been made from steel. One alternative is incredibly strong, incredibly lightweight hardened fabric, if carbon fiber can be made to be cost competitive by reducing the cost of the material and improving production methods of components.

Major cost reductions are needed in both the precursor materials and in the conversion processes that transform precursor into finished fibers to enable more widespread application of carbon-fiber components.

With such innovation passenger vehicles could become safer and more fuel efficient.

Green Car Congress reports that researchers at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), working as part of a consortium with Ford, General Motors and DaimlerChrysler, have begun to develop high-volume renewable sources of carbon fiber feedstocks in an attempt to lower their cost.

Other information for this post came from Jerry Halstead, who helped to educate his readers about fun with carbon fiber composites by pointing to an informative article in MPH Magazine (February 2006). They talk my language.

The actual strength of a swatch of carbon fiber depends on how many layers it has, just as when you wrap something in layer upon layer of duct tape to beef it up. Except that carbon fiber is way stronger and might actually work.

What I learned from them is that the functionality of carbon-fiber composites depends as much on the matrix as how the carbon fibers are layered in various directions to improve strength in all directions.

Over time, the layers of carbon fiber can start to separate, which is called delamination. Also, when it fails, it fails catastrophically, usually shattering or, at best, cracking badly (see Kimi Raikkonen’s suspension-arm disintegration on the last lap of the F1 race at the Nürburgring).