Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) has been investigated as a low-cost manufacturing method for fiber-reinforced composites. The traditional and mature technology for manufacturing continuous-carbon-fiber-reinforced plastics is Automated Fiber Placement (AFP), which uses a consolidation roller and an autoclave process to improve the quality of parts. Compared to AFP, FDM is simple in design and operation but lacks the ability to pressurize and heat the model. In this work, a novel method for printing continuous carbon-fiber-reinforced plastics with a pressure roller was investigated. First, the path processing of the pressure roller was researched, which will reduce the number of rotations of the pressure roller and increase the service life of the equipment and the efficiency of printing. Thereafter, three specimens were printed under different pressures and the tensile and bending strength of specimens were tested. The tensile strength and bending strength of specimens were enhanced to 644.8 MPa and 401.24 MPa by increasing the pressure, compared to the tensile strength and bending strength of specimens without pressure of 109.9 MPa and 163.13 MPa. However, excessive pressure will destroy the path of the continuous carbon fiber (CCF) and the surface quality of the model, and may even lead to printing failure.
Keywords: 3D printing; FDM; composites; continuous carbon fiber; pressure.