Advanced Polymer Composite Molding Through Intelligent Process Analysis and Control
Abstract
To prevent dry spot formation in RTM, a control interface and four different adaptive control algorithms were developed and tested with numerical simulations. The interface is capable of controlling the flow pattern of resin as it fills a mold containing a preform. The mold is equipped with multiple inlet gates, a single vent and a spinal sensor system that continuously feeds the interface with the resin flow front location along the spine lines connecting the inlet gates to the vent. Four different adaptive control algorithms targeting on injection flow rate control, injection pressure control, linearly-corrected pressure control, and the combined flow rate and linearly-connected pressure control were developed. Placement of the gates-sensors in addition to the possibility of permeability disturbances (race-tracking) could affect the filling pattern and ultimately the controllability of the developed schemes. To overcome this a sue, the location of the gates-sensors was optimized based on the minimization of void formation and filling time. Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) coupled with adaptive control was implemented on the aforementioned problem and results were compared to previous work using Selective Exhaustive Search (SES) and Genetic Algorithm (GA). Three journal papers and six conference papers have been published.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Mar 30, 2007
- Accession Number
- ADA468818
Entities
People
- Bob Minaie
Organizations
- Wichita State University