Teijin Limited has qualified its carbon fiber and polyether ether ketone (PEEK) based materials Tenax™ ThermoPlastic Woven Fabric (TPWF) and Tenax™ ThermoPlastic Consolidated Laminate (TPCL) with NCAMP (National Center for Advanced Materials Performance). The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), and Agencia Nacional de Aviacao (ANAC – National Civil Aviation Agency of Brazil), accept composite specification and design values developed using the NCAMP process. 

This is the first NCAMP qualification of a carbon fabric reinforced thermoplastic composite material. It is also the first NCAMP qualification of pre-consolidated laminates, which can be used for rapid thermoforming of stamped structural components.

This qualification makes PEEK carbon fabric and consolidated laminate materials technology accessible to a much larger range of OEMs, Tier one, and Tier two suppliers. Manufacturers can use the public NCAMP database to demonstrate equivalency and gain FAA certification at lower cost than qualifying materials themselves. This will be of interest for a wide variety of OEM’s which are considering formed shapes with thermoplastic fabric and stamped forms like clips and brackets. Thermoplastic composites are attractive for the growing Urban Air Mobility market and traditional commercial aerospace sectors considering the benefits thermoplastics offer: high build rates, improved crack resistance, melt processing, increased opportunities for recycling, room temp storage and shelf life measured in years.

Tenax™ TPWF is a woven carbon fiber fabric coated with a thermoplastic polymer and TenaxTM TPCL are completely impregnated, and consolidated sheets made of several layers of TenaxTM TPWF. 

The qualified product is based on woven TenaxTM high strength carbon fiber and Vestakeep® polyetheretherketone (PEEK) polymer from Evonik Industries AG, which achieves high heat, impact and fatigue resistance. Cost reduction is achieved through rapid molding processes allowing improved component manufacturing efficiency. This material is suited for large-scale production of aerospace structural components with high performance requirements.

In order to further support the introduction of this technology, Teijin created a material card of this specific material which is used for process simulation using Aniform® software. This will help part makers and OEM optimize the thermoforming process in order to obtain all benefits of this type of material within a short time and low cost for the process setup.