Mechanical and thermal study of 3D printing composite filaments from wind turbine waste

The subject of composite waste from the wind turbine blades has become more serious and challenging. Inspired by the recent popularity of the 3D printing industry, this work presents a step-by-step recycling solution to manufacture fiber reinforced filaments for fused filament fabrication. Polylactic acid filaments reinforced with 3, 5, and 10 wt% recyclate content are manufactured and tested using thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), and micro computed tomography (mu CT). TGA results elucidate that an increase in the recyclate content translates into a reduction in the mean fiber length. Visualizing mu CT results, it is confirmed that fibers are predominantly aligned along the filament length. Tensile specimens per ASTM D636 standard are manufactured and tested with results showing an improvement of, respectively, 20% and 28% in the specific tensile strength and modulus compared with pure PLA samples. The mechanical performance of the newly introduced recycled parts is also assessed through a coherent set of theoretical models, where an excellent agreement between the experiments and predictions is observed.

Automated summary

The study introduces a recycling solution to manufacture fiber reinforced PLA filaments for fused filament fabrication. It is found that an increase in recyclate content leads to a reduction in fiber length. Tensile testing shows a significant improvement of 20% in specific tensile strength and 28% in modulus for the newly introduced recycled parts compared to pure PLA samples.