Born in the late 50’s from a combined research program of the Osaka National institute for industrial research in Japan and the Royal Aircraft Establishment based in UK.

Carbon fibres are thin filaments (6 to 20 µm in diameter,  1 µm = 1/1000th of a mm) joined together to make yarns which contain between 1000 to 3000 filaments.

The producers are Chemical groups either from Japan (Toray, Toho, Mitsubishi, Nippon Graphite) or the United States (Amoco, Hercules)

The structure and mechanical properties of Carbon fibres, tensile strength, stiffness, rigidity and  lightness explain why they are used so much in Airplanes and sporting goods.

New methods for the production of electricity such as wind turbines, development of major projects such as the AIRBUS A380, have lead to an increase of the worldwide demand and an overall shortage of carbon. There are currently not enough suppliers of carbon to cope with this demand and new factories are being built constantly. The production of carbon is still a relatively small industry with an annual output about 20000 Tons. That is why the price stays relatively high and at the moment is constantly on the increase.

Carbon fibres can be split in 2 families : PAN fibres (PolyAcryoloNitriles) made by Carbonisation of Acrylic fibres (Modulus up to 600Gpa) and PITCH fibres made from a residue found in Petrol (Modulus over 650Gpa).

PAN carbon fibre currently represents about 90% of the worldwide production quantity. PITCH carbons which are very high modulus are mainly used in high technology products such as Satellites and fishing rods and poles.

There are 2 main families, High strength (HS/HR) with a modulus below 300Gpa and High Modulus (over 300Gpa)

HR/HS             High Strength                       230Gpa
IM                   Intermediate Modulus            300-350Gpa
HM                  High Modulus                       400Gpa
VHM               Very High Modulus                 450-600Gpa
SHM               Super High Modulus                over 650Gpa

To transform these carbon fibres into a “real” product they must be mixed with a kind of glue called a “resin”. The aim of this “resin” is to join all these fibres together to turn the carbon into a material which can create products which will be durable enough to cope with the what they are intended to do.

These resin are “thermo sets” which means that they will harden under heat .

These resins are mainly Phenolic, Polyester or Epoxy.

The choice of the resin comes from the fibres used as well as the properties required. The mix of fibres and resin (in a 60% / 40% ratio) will create a composite material, its characteristics will make it behave like a metal but with the properties (corrosion resistance and weight) of plastics.

These fibres can be:
Directly wound : after being dipped in resin, using computer controlled filament winding machines.

Woven : to create fabrics with fibres in 2 directions

Laid side by side  held in place by thermo set resins to create  unidirectional sheets.