Topic 11: Manufactured Material Composite Materials

Learning Outcomes: 1. 2. 3. 4. State the types of composite materials State the composition of composite materials State the properties of composite materials State the uses of composite materials in our daily life

Introduction Unlike many natural and artificial/man-made materials, which find applications by chance only after they have been discovered or invented, composites are often carefully designed with a particular application in mind. Originally developed as light and strong materials for the aerospace industry in the mid-20th century, they have now found their way into a wide range of products, from stealth bombers to Smart cars and from bridges to oil rigs. What is Composite? According to the American Composites Manufacturers Association (ACMA), composite materials are the combination of two or more materials to reinforce their properties and make them stronger together than they are apart. Composites are made by combining two or more natural or artificial materials to maximize their useful properties and minimize their weaknesses. One of the oldest and best-known composites, glass-fiber reinforced plastic (GRP or FRP), combines glass fibers (which are strong but brittle) with plastic (which is flexible) to make a composite material that is tough but not brittle. Composites are typically used in place of metals because they are equally strong but much lighter. Composites exist in nature. A piece of wood is a composite, with long fibres of cellulose (a very complex form of starch) held together by a much weaker substance called lignin. Cellulose is also found in cotton and linen, but it is the binding power of the lignin that makes a piece of timber much stronger than a bundle of cotton fibres. Composition of composite materials

Composites are composed of resins, reinforcements, fillers, and additives. Each of these constituent materials or ingredients play an important role in the processing and final performance of the end product. The resin or polymer is the glue that holds the composite together and influences the physical properties of the end product. The reinforcement provides the mechanical strength. The fillers and additives are used as process or performance aids to impart special properties to the end product.

Composite materials consist of two or more materials combined in such a way that the individual materials are easily distinguishable. A common example of a composite is concrete. It consists of a binder (cement) and a reinforcement (gravel). Adding another reinforcement (rebar) transforms concrete into a three-phase composite. 1

The individual materials that make up composites are called constituents. Most composites have two constituent materials: a binder or matrix, and a reinforcement. The reinforcement is usually much stronger and stiffer than the matrix, and gives the composite its good properties. The matrix holds the reinforcements in an orderly pattern. Because the reinforcements are usually discontinuous, the matrix also helps to transfer load among the reinforcements.

Reinforcements basically come in three forms: particulate, discontinuous fiber, and continuous fiber. A particle has roughly equal dimensions in all directions, though it doesn't have to be spherical. Gravel, micro balloons, and resin powder are examples of particulate reinforcements. Reinforcements become fibers when one dimension becomes long compared to others. Discontinuous reinforcements (chopped fibers, milled fibers, or whiskers) vary in length from a few millimeters to a few centimeters. Most fibers are only a few microns in diameter, so it doesn't take much length to make the transition from particle to fiber. With either particles or short fibers, the matrix must transfer the load at very short intervals. Thus, the composite properties cannot come close to the reinforcement properties. With continuous fibers, however, there are few if any breaks in the reinforcements. Composite properties are much higher, and continuous fibers are therefore used in most high performance components, be they aerospace structures or sporting goods.

Matrix materials are usually some type of plastic, and these composites are often called reinforced plastics. There are other types of matrices, such as metal or ceramic, but plastics are by far the most common. There are also many types of plastics, but a discussion of them is beyond the scope of this week's column. Suffice it to say for now that the two most common plastic matrices are epoxy resins and polyester resins. The matrix binds the fibers together somewhat like an adhesive and makes them more resistant to external damage, whereas the fibers make the matrix stronger and stiffer and help it resist cracks and fractures. Fibers and matrix are usually (but not always) made from different types of materials. The fibers are typically glass, carbon, silicon carbide, or asbestos, while the matrix is usually plastic, metal, or a ceramic material (though materials such as concrete may also be used). Classification of composite materials These three types of matrixes produce three common class/types of composites: Polymer matrix composites (PMCs), of which GRP is the best-known example, use ceramic fibers in a plastic matrix. Metal-matrix composites (MMCs) typically use silicon carbide fibers embedded in a matrix made from an alloy of aluminum and magnesium, but other matrix materials such as titanium, copper, and iron are increasingly being used. Typical applications of MMCs include bicycles, golf clubs, and missile guidance systems; an MMC made from siliconcarbide fibers in a titanium matrix is currently being developed for use as the skin (fuselage material) of the US National Aerospace Plane. 2

Ceramic-matrix composites (CMCs) are the third major type and examples include silicon carbide fibers fixed in a matrix made from a borosilicate glass. The ceramic matrix makes them particularly suitable for use in lightweight, high-temperature components, such as parts for airplane jet engines

Composite materials are available as plies or lamina. A single ply consists of fibers oriented in a single direction (unidirectional) or in two directions (bidirectional; for example a woven fabric). There are other forms, but these are the most important for this discussion. Types of composite materials There are two types of composite materials, those that form naturally and those that are synthetic (man-made). Composite materials are usually classified by the type of reinforcement they use. This reinforcement is embedded into a matrix that holds it together. The reinforcement is used to strengthen the composite. For example, in a mud brick, the matrix is the mud and the reinforcement is the straw. Common composite types include random-fiber or short-fiber reinforcement, continuous-fiber or long-fiber reinforcement, particulate reinforcement, flake reinforcement, and filler reinforcement. Types of Composite Natural Composites Composites can be easily found in nature. Wood is an example of a composite because cellulose fibers are held together by substance called lignin. These fibers can be found in cotton and thread, but it's the bonding power of lignin in wood that makes it much tougher. Another natural composite is rock and sand, materials used in concrete. Rock is just smaller rocks held together, and sand is made of small grains Mud Bricks One type of very old composite material invented by early humans was the mud brick. A normal mud brick is sturdy and resistant to compression, but can break if bent. Straw is a material that has excellent tensile strength, meaning that it resists stretching. By combining both, early humans were able to create composite mud bricks that could resist weight and compression as well as stretching. Concrete Concrete is a composite material made of cement, sand, stones and water. Combined, concrete is stronger than any one of these materials. Concrete is used heavily in building and road construction. Fiberglass Fiberglass is a material made of tiny glass shards held together by resin and other components. In the automotive industry, fiberglass is important for making body kits. The body shell for a car is made up of different layers of fiberglass, such as a gel-coat layer, tissue layer, matting 3

and cloth. The final product is a complete, waterproof, lightweight and strong body kit. Fiberglass can also be a less expensive alternative to other materials. Ceramic

Ceramics once referred purely to pottery and to articles made by firing materials extracted from Earth. Today, the term has a much broader definition. Ceramics are generally thought of as inorganic and nonmetallic solids with a range of useful properties, including very high hardness and strength, extremely high melting points, and good electrical and thermal insulation.

The best-known ceramics are pottery, glass, brick, porcelain, and cement. But the general definition of a ceramica nonmetallic and inorganic solidis so broad that it covers a much wider range of materials.

At one end of the scale, ceramics include simple materials such as graphite and diamond, made up from different crystalline arrangements of the element carbon. But at the other end of the scale, complex crystals of yttrium, barium,copper, and oxygen make up the advanced ceramics used in so-called high temperature superconductors (materials with almost no electrical resistance). Most ceramics fall somewhere between these extremes.

Many are metal oxides, crystalline compounds of a metal element and oxygen. Others are silicides, borides, carbides, and nitrides, respectively made from silicon, boron, carbon, and nitrogen. Some of the most advanced ceramic materials are combinations of ceramics and other materials known as ceramic matrix composites (CMCs). Ceramics can be divided into two classes: traditional and advanced. Traditional ceramics include clay products, silicate glass and cement; while advanced ceramics consist of carbides (SiC), pure oxides (Al2O3), nitrides (Si3N4), non-silicate glasses and many others. Ceramics offer many advantages compared to other materials. They are harder and stiffer than steel; more heat and corrosion resistant than metals or polymers; less dense than most metals and their alloys; and their raw materials are both plentiful and inexpensive. Ceramic materials display a wide range of properties which facilitate their use in many different product areas. Ceramics are all around us. This category of materials includes things like tile, bricks, plates, glass, and toilets. Ceramics can be found in products like watches (quartz tuning forks-the time keeping devices in watches), snow skies (piezoelectric-ceramics that stress when a voltage is applied to them), automobiles (sparkplugs and ceramic engine parts found in racecars), and phone lines. They can also be found on space shuttles, appliances (enamel coatings), and airplanes (nose cones). Depending on their method of formation, ceramics can be dense or lightweight. Typically, they will demonstrate excellent strength and hardness properties; however, they are often brittle in nature. Ceramics can also be formed to serve as electrically conductive materials, objects allowing electricity to pass through their mass, or insulators, materials preventing the flow of electricity. Some ceramics, like superconductors, also display magnetic properties.

 Ceramics are generally made by taking mixtures of clay, earthen elements, powders, and water and shaping them into desired forms. Once the ceramic has been shaped, it is fired in a high temperature oven known as a kiln. Often, ceramics are covered in decorative, waterproof, paint-like substances known as glazes. Ceramic Processing Ceramic processing is used to produce commercial products that are very diverse in size, shape, detail, complexity, and material composition, structure, and cost. The purpose of ceramics processing to an applied science is the natural result of an increasing ability to refine, develop, and characterize ceramic materials. Ceramics are typically produced by the application of heat upon processed clays and other natural raw materials to form a rigid product. Ceramic products that use naturally occurring rocks and minerals as a starting material must undergo special processing in order to control purity, particle size, particle size distribution, and heterogeneity. These attributes play a big role in the final properties of the finished ceramic. Chemically prepared powders also are used as starting materials for some ceramic products. These synthetic materials can be controlled to produce powders with precise chemical compositions and particle size. The next step is to form the ceramic particles into a desired shape. This is accomplished by the addition of water and/or additives such as binders, followed by a shape forming process. Some of the most common forming methods for ceramics include extrusion, slip casting, pressing, tape casting and injection molding. After the particles are formed, these "green" ceramics undergo a heat-treatment (called firing or sintering) to produce a rigid, finished product. Some ceramic products such as electrical insulators, dinnerware and tile may then undergo a glazing process. Some ceramics for advanced applications may undergo a machining and/or polishing step in order meet specific engineering design criteria.

Properties of ceramics Ceramics are best known as brittle solids particularly suited for withstanding high temperatures but, in fact, the different materials used in ceramics can give them a wide range of properties. The classic properties of ceramics include durability, strength and brittleness, high electrical and thermal resistance, and an ability to withstand the damaging effects of acids, oxygen, and other chemicals because of their inertness (chemical unreactivity). But not all ceramics behave in this way. For example, graphite is a very soft ceramic and conducts electricity well, whereas diamond is a very good conductor of heat. Ceramics called ferrites are particularly good conductors of electricity and superconductors have almost no electrical resistance at all. Ceramic matrix composites, made by embedding fibres of a strengthening material in what is known as a ceramic matrix, are not at all brittle.

In general, most ceramics are:

hard, wear-resistant, brittle, refractory, 5

thermal insulators, electrical insulators, nonmagnetic, oxidation resistant, prone to thermal shock, and chemically stable.

How ceramics are made

Firing is the process by which ceramics have traditionally been made; indeed, the word "ceramic" can be traced back to a Sanksrit word meaning "to burn." Simple ceramics such as bricks and certain types of glass are still made by processes that would be recognized by people who lived thousands of years ago. Just as in ancient times, today's pottery is made by digging clay from the ground, mixing it with water to make it flexible, shaping it on a wheel or in a mold, and then firing it in a kiln. Some of today's processes are more sophisticated than the techniques of past times. Machines have long been used in processes such as extrusion (forcing a material into shape by squeezing it like toothpaste through a shaped tool), jiggering (laying the material automatically into a rotating mold), or hot pressing (forcing a powdered form of the ceramic into a mold then simultaneously heating it and pressing it to fuse the material into shape). The latest industrial ceramics sometimes demand more advanced production processes. Extremely tough ceramics made of silicon nitride are made by a method called reaction bonding. This involves forming silicon powder into the desired shape then heating it with nitrogen gas. Because the silicon powder already occupies the same volume as the finished product, grains of silicon nitride can form only by fusing together tightly. Uses of Ceramic Space Shuttle When NASA's Space Shuttle returns from space, thousands of heat-resistant tiles protect its exterior from overheating due to friction generated by Earth's atmosphere. Current models of the Shuttle use different tiles made from carbon, ceramics, and silica composites. But future versions of the craft are expected to use a new, slim line ceramic material made from hafnium and zirconium metals that will enable it to be both more aerodynamic and withstand temperatures up to 4300F (2400C). Superconductor Superconductorsmaterials that have practically no electrical resistancewere discovered in 1911, but found few practical applications because they became superconducting only at temperatures close to absolute zero (459.67F or 273.15C). But in the 1980s, scientists invented new types of ceramic superconductors that showed superconductivity at temperatures as high as 292F (180C). High-temperature superconductors such as this are expected to find many new applications, including high-speed, magnetic levitation ("maglev") trains and super-fast computers. Electrical insulators Ceramics made from alumina (aluminum oxide) and porcelain are widely used in insulators that protect electrical equipment outdoors. Ceramics have been used as the insulation in automobile spark plugs since the early 20th century. 6

Glass What is glass and how is it produced?

Believe it or not, glass is liquid sand. You can make glass by heating ordinary sand (which is mostly made of silicon dioxide) until it melts and turns into a liquid. You won't find that happening on your local beach: sand melts at the incredibly high temperature of 1700C (3090F).

When molten sand cools, it doesn't turn back into the gritty yellow stuff you started out with: it undergoes a complete transformation and gains an entirely different inner structure. But it doesn't matter how much you cool the sand, it never quite sets into a solid. Instead, it becomes a kind of frozen liquid or what materials scientists refer to as an amorphous solid. It's like a cross between a solid and a liquid with some of the crystalline order of a solid and some of the molecular randomness of a liquid.

Glass is such a popular material in our homes because it has all kinds of really useful properties. Apart from being transparent, it's inexpensive to make, easy to shape when it's molten, reasonably resistant to heat when it's set, chemically inert (so a glass jar doesn't react with the things you put inside it), and it can be recycled any number of times.

Glass is a hard material normally fragile and transparent common in our daily life. It is composed mainly of sand (silicates, SiO2) and an alkali. These materials at high temperature (i.e. molten viscous state) fuse together; then they are cooled rapidly forming a rigid structure, however not having enough time to form a crystalline regular structure.

Depending on the final use and application the composition of the glass and cooling rate will vary to achieve the adequate properties for the specific application. These are the common ingredients to obtain glass: 1. Sand (SiO2 silica) In its pure form it exists as a polymer, (SiO2)n. 2. Soda ash (sodium carbonate Na2CO3) Normally SiO2 softens up to 2000C, where it starts to degrade (at 1713C most of the molecules can already move freely). Adding soda will lower the melting point to 1000C making it more manageable. 3. Limestone (calcium carbonate or CaCO3) or dolomite (MgCO3) 7

Also known as lime, calcium carbonate is found naturally as limestone, marble, or chalk. The soda makes the glass water-soluble, soft and not very durable. Therefore lime is added increasing the hardness and chemical durability and providing insolubility of the materials .

Other materials and oxides can be added to increase properties (tinting, durability, etc.), produce different effects, colors, etc. Main properties of glass These are the main characteristics of glass:

- Solid and hard material - Disordered and amorphous structure - Fragile and easily breakable into sharp pieces - Transparent to visible light - Inert and biologically inactive material. - Glass is 100% recyclable and one of the safest packaging materials due to its composition and properties

Types of glass and market application The main types of glass are described below: Commercial glass or Soda-lime glass: This is the most common commercial glass and less expensive. The composition of soda-lime glass is normally 60-75% silica, 12-18% soda, and 5-12% lime. A low percentage of other materials can be added for specific properties such as coloring. It has light transmission appropriate to be use in flat glass in windows; It has a smooth and nonporous surface that allows glass bottles and packaging glass to be easily cleaned; Soda-lime glass containers are virtually inert, resistant to chemical attack from aqueous solutions so they will not contaminate the contents inside or affect the taste. Whereas pure glass SiO2 does not absorb UV light, soda-lime glass does not allow light at a wavelength of lower than 400 nm (UV light) to pass. The disadvantages of soda-lime glass are that is not resistant to high temperatures and sudden thermal changes. For example, everybody has experienced a glass breaking down when pouring liquid at high temperature, for example to make tea. Some of the use of soda-lime glass is primarily used for bottles, jars, everyday drinking glasses, and window glass. Lead glass:

Lead glass is composed of 54-65% SiO2, 18-38% lead oxide (PbO), 13-15% soda (Na2O) or potash (K2O), and various other oxides. When the content of PbO is less than 18% is known as crystal glass. In moderate amounts lead increases durability; In high amounts it lowers the melting point and decreases the hardness giving a soft surface; 8

In addition it has a high refractive index giving high brilliance glass. These two last properties make it appropriate for decorating purposes. Glass with high lead oxide contents (i.e. 65%) may be used as radiation shielding glass because lead absorb gamma rays and other forms of harmful radiation, for example, for nuclear industry. As with soda-lime glass, lead glass will not withstand high temperatures or sudden changes in temperature.

Borosilicate glass:

Borosilicate glass is mainly composed of silica (70-80%), boric oxide B2O3 (7-13%) and smaller amounts of the alkalis (sodium and potassium oxides) such as 4-8% of Na2O and K2O, and 2-7% aluminum oxide (Al2O3). Boron gives greater resistance to thermal changes and chemical corrosion. It is suitable for industrial chemical process plants, in laboratories, in the pharmaceutical industry, in bulbs for high-powered lamps, etc. Borosilicate glass is also used in the home for cooking plates and other heat-resistant products. It is used for domestic kitchens and chemistry laboratories, this is because it has greater resistance to thermal shock and allows for greater accuracy in laboratory measurements when heating and cooling experiments.

There are other special types of glass by adding different substances. For example:
Element Properties

Alumina It improves chemical resistance and increases viscosity in lower temperature ranges Cerium To absorb infrared rays

Metals and metal oxides to change color (ex. manganese and selenium to decolorized gas, Coloring cobalt for blue, copper for red, nickel produces blue, violet or black glass, titanium produces agents yellowish-brown, etc.). Barium oxide Fluorine Glass containing barium is not quite as heavy as lead crystal, but achieves similar brilliance due to its high refractive index. Fluorine-containing materials, such as fluorspar (CaF2) or phosphates to form small crystalline particles in the glass which gives them a cloudy and opaque impression

Liquid crystals What are liquid crystals? Photo: Liquid crystals dried and viewed through polarized light. You can see they have a much more regular structure than an ordinary liquid. Photo from research by David Weitz courtesy of NASA Marshall Space Flight Center (NASA-MSFC).

Solids, liquids, and gases are the three different forms a substance can takewe call them states of matterand up until the late 19th century, scientists thought that was the end of the story. Then, in 1888, an Austrian chemist named Friedrich Reinitzer (18571927) discovered liquid crystals, which are another state entirely, somewhere in between liquids and solids. Liquid crystals might have lingered in obscurity but for the fact that they turned out to have some very useful properties. Solids are frozen lumps of matter that stay put all by themselves, often with their atoms packed in a neat, regular arrangement called a crystal (or crystalline lattice). Liquids lack the order of solids and, though they stay put if you keep them in a container, they flow relatively easily when you pour them out. Now imagine a substance with some of the order of a solid and some of the fluidity of a liquid. What you have is a liquid crystala kind of halfway house in between. We're used to the idea that a given substance can be in one of three states: solid, liquid, or gas. At any given moment, liquid crystals can be in one of several possible "substates" (phases) somewhere in a limbo-land between solid and liquid. The two most important liquid crystal phases are called nematic and smectic:

When they're in the nematic phase, liquid crystals are a bit like a liquid: their molecules can move around and shuffle past one another, but they all point in broadly the same direction. They're a bit like matches in a matchbox: you can shake them and move them about but they all keep pointing the same way. If you cool liquid crystals, they shift over to the smectic phase. Now the molecules form into layers that can slide past one another relatively easily. The molecules in a given layer can move about within it, but they can't and don't move into the other layers (a bit like people working for different companies on particular floors of an office block). There are actually several different smectic "subphases," but we won't go into them in any more detail here. 10

Flatscreen LCD and plasma screens work in a completely different way. If you sit up close to a flatscreen TV, you'll notice that the picture is made from millions of tiny blocks called pixels (picture elements).

Each one of these is effectively a separate red, blue, or green light that can be switched on or off very rapidly to make the moving color picture. The pixels are controlled in completely different ways in plasma and LCD screens.

In a plasma screen, each pixel is a tiny fluorescent lamp switched on or off electronically. In an LCD television, the pixels are switched on or off electronically using liquid crystals to rotate polarized light. That's not as complex as it sounds! To understand what's going on, first we need to understand what liquid crystals are; then we need to look more closely at light and how it travels. How LCD televisions use liquid crystals and polarized light

An LCD TV screen uses the sunglasses trick to switch its colored pixels on or off. At the back of the screen, there's a large bright light that shines out toward the viewer. In front of this, there are the millions of pixels, each one made up of smaller areas called sub-pixels that are coloured red, blue, or green. Each pixel has a polarizing glass filter behind it and another one in front of it at 90 degrees. That means the pixel normally looks dark. In between the two polarizing filters there's a tiny twisted, nematic liquid crystal that can be switched on or off (twisted or untwisted) electronically. When it's switched on, it rotates the light passing through it through 90 degrees, effectively allowing light to flow through the two polarizing filters and making the pixel look bright. Each pixel is controlled by a separate transistor (a tiny electronic component) that can switch it on or off many times each second.

Thin films A thin film is a layer of material ranging from fractions of a nanometre (monolayer) to several micrometres in thickness. Electronic semiconductor devices and optical coatings are the main applications benefiting from thin film construction.

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A familiar application of thin films is the household mirror which typically has a thin metal coating on the back of a sheet of glass to form a reflective interface. The process of silvering was once commonly used to produce mirrors. A very thin film coating (less than a nanometre) is used to produce two-way mirrors. Ceramic thin films are in wide use. The relatively high hardness and inertness of ceramic materials make this type of thin coating of interest for protection of substrate materials against corrosion, oxidation and wear. In particular, the use of such coatings on cutting tools can extend the life of these items by several orders of magnitude. Thin film composite membranes (TFC or TFM) are semipermeable membranes manufactured principally for use in water purification or water desalination systems. They also have use in chemical applications such as batteries and fuel cells. Essentially, a TFC material is a molecular sieve constructed in the form of a film from two or more layered materials. Membranes used in reverse osmosis are typically made out of polyimide, chosen primarily for its permeability to water and relative impermeability to various dissolved impurities including salt ions and other small, unfilterable molecules. Uses Thin film composite membranes are used in Water purification; as a chemical reaction buffer (batteries and fuel cells); in industrial gas separations.

Properties of composite materials Composite materials are strong, durable, lightweight, flexible and corrosion-resistant. Composite properties are best in the direction of the fibers. Perpendicular, or transverse, to the fibers, the matrix properties dominate because load must be transferred by the matrix every fiber diameter. Because most structures are not loaded in a single direction, even though one direction may dominate, it is necessary to orient fibers in multiple directions. This is accomplished by stacking multiple plies together. Such a stack is called a laminate. The mechanical properties and composition of FRP composites can be tailored for their intended use. The type and quantity of materials selected in addition to the manufacturing process to fabricate the product, will affect the mechanical properties and performance. Important considerations for the design of composite products include: Type of fiber reinforcement Percentage of fiber or fiber volume Orientation of fiber (0o, 90o, +/- 45 oor a combination of these) Type of resin 12

Cost of product Volume of production (to help determine the best manufacturing method) Manufacturing process Service conditions FRP composites have many benefits to their selection and use. The selection of the materials depends on the performance and intended use of the product. The composites designer can tailor the performance of the end product with proper selection of materials. It is important for the end-user to understand the application environment, load performance and durability requirements of the product and convey this information to the composites industry professional. A summary of composite material benefits include: Light weight High strength-to-weight ratio Directional strength Corrosion resistance Weather resistance Dimensional stability low thermal conductivity low coefficient of thermal expansion Radar transparency Non-magnetic High impact strength High dielectric strength (insulator) Low maintenance Long term durability Part consolidation Small to large part geometry possible Tailored surface finish

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Choosing materials for the matrix

For the matrix, many modern composites use thermosetting or thermosoftening plastics (also called resins). (The use of plastics in the matrix explains the name 'reinforced plastics' commonly given to composites). The plastics are polymers that hold the reinforcement together and help to determine the physical properties of the end product. Thermosetting plastics are liquid when prepared but harden and become rigid (ie, they cure) when they are heated. The setting process is irreversible, so that these materials do not become soft under high temperatures. These plastics also resist wear and attack by chemicals making them very durable, even when exposed to extreme environments. Thermosoftening plastics, as the name implies, are hard at low temperatures but soften when they are heated. Although they are less commonly used than thermosetting plastics they do have some advantages, such as greater fracture toughness, long shelf life of the raw material, capacity for recycling and a cleaner, safer workplace because organic solvents are not needed for the hardening process. Ceramics, carbon and metals are used as the matrix for some highly specialised purposes. For example, ceramics are used when the material is going to be exposed to high temperatures (eg, heat exchangers) and carbon is used for products that are exposed to friction and wear (eg, bearings and gears).

Examples of Composites

The most common example of a "composite" in a broad sense is concrete. In this use, structural steel rebar provides the strength and stiffness to the concrete, while the cured cement holds the rebar stationary. Rebar alone would flex too much and cement alone would crack easily. However, when combined to form a composite, an extremely rigid material is created. The composite material most commonly associated with the term "composite" is Fiber Reinforced Plastics (FRP). This type of composite is used extensively throughout our daily lives. Common everyday uses of fiber reinforced plastic composites include: Aircraft Boats and marine Sporting equipments (Golf shafts, tennis rackets, surfboards, hockey sticks, etc.) Automotive components Wind turbine blades Body armor Building materials Water pipes Bridges Tool handles Ladder rails

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Product Area Aerospace Consumer Uses

Product space shuttle tiles, thermal barriers, high temperature glass windows, fuel cells glassware, windows, pottery, Corning ware, magnets, dinnerware, ceramic tiles, lenses, home electronics, microwave transducers

Automotive

catalytic converters, ceramic filters, airbag sensors, ceramic rotors, valves, spark plugs, pressure sensors, thermistors, vibration sensors, oxygen sensors, safety glass windshields, piston rings

Medical (Bioceramics) orthopedic joint replacement, prosthesis, dental restoration, bone implants structural components for ground, air and naval vehicles, missiles, sensors

Military

Computers insulators, resistors, superconductors, capacitors, ferroelectric components, microelectronic packaging bricks, cement, membranes and filters, lab equipment

Other Industries

Communications Benefits of Composites

fiber optic/laser communications, TV and radio components, microphones

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In comparison to common materials used today such as metal and wood, composites can provide a distinct advantage. The primary driver and advantage in the adoption of composites is the lightweight properties. In transportation, less weight equates to more fuel savings and improved acceleration. In sporting equipment, lightweight composites allow for longer drives in golf, faster swings in tennis, and straighter shots in archery. While in wind energy, the less a blade weighs, the more power the turbine can produce. Besides weight savings, the most important benefits of composites include: Non-corrosive Non-conductive Flexible, will not dent Low maintenance Long life Design flexibility

References http://www.science.org.au/nova/059/059key.htm http://composite.about.com/od/aboutcompositesplastics/l/aa060297.htm http://www.ehow.com/about_5868282_types-composite-materials.html http://www.explainthatstuff.com/ceramics.html http://www.explainthatstuff.com/lcdtv.html Robyn L. Johnson, Ceramics in the Classroom; http://www.acers.org/membership/sc/Ceramics.doc http://www.acers.org/acers/aboutceramics.asp?id=outreach#Definition http://matse1.matse.illinois.edu/ceramics/ware.html http://www.mdacomposites.org/mda/psgbridge_cb_materials.html http://www.ehow.com/facts_5845360_definition-composite-materials_.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thin_film_composite_membrane

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