Under the effect of different process parameters, the temperature field inside the thermoplastic fiber is very complex and directly affects the fusion quality between the resins. Considering the heat transfer behavior of thermoplastic fiber polyether ether ketone (PEEK) as the research object, a mathematical model of heat transfer in the thermoplastic composite fiber placement with the relevant boundary conditions was established. Ansys Parametric Design Language (APDL) was used to generate the finite element model and simulate the transient process, not only to explore the influence of various process parameters on the temperature field, but also to build an online temperature field measurement system. The influence rules of placement process parameters and mold initial temperature with respect to the temperature field in the first layer were obtained. Combining the relationship between heating temperature and placement speed, when the first layer was laid, the placement process temperature could be quickly reached by low speed and high temperature. The temperature data were collected by the online detection system. Compared with the temperature data from the simulation, the error was below 8%, which verified the correctness of the heat transfer model. The academic research results will lay a theoretical foundation for the thermoplastic fiber placement.
Keywords: PEEK; automatic placement; temperature field; thermoplastic fiber.