Haydale is pleased to announce the launch of three graphene enhanced carbon fibre prepreg products in collaboration with SHD Composites, based in Lincolnshire, UK utilising certain Huntsman Advanced Materials epoxy resins.

The products to be launched by SHD and HCS are: 

  • A structural component carbon fibre prepreg (resin pre-impregnated woven fabric) with improved toughness and mechanical properties initially aimed at the automotive, marine and sports goods sectors
  • A prototype “Out-of-Autoclave” curing carbon fibre tooling prepreg capable of being used for fast composite part production in autoclave processing
  • Autoclave higher operating temperature tooling prepreg for enhanced life and very high accuracy (stability) tooling.
The primary drivers for the structural component prepreg were to increase the impact resistance and compression after impact performance of carbon fibre reinforced epoxy components through the addition of graphene nano materials. It is anticipated that this will enable designers to develop lighter and more efficient carbon fibre reinforced epoxy structures where impact is the principal design consideration. Applications include aerospace, automotive and many sports goods such as bike frames, fishing rods, racing boats etc.
The market need is for tooling systems with increased thermal conductivity ( to reduce process cycle times) , significantly reduced spring-back and greatly improved accuracy, improved surface finish and hardness, better impact resistance and finally increased resistance to micro-cracking through life over the current prepreg market offering.
These graphene enhanced materials are currently going through extensive evaluation and are available as prototype products to interested companies for their particular areas of application. The Technical Support teams from SHD and HCS will offer assistance in material selection and initial development of parts and tooling to interested companies and organisations planning to gain market leadership in the aforementioned sectors.
Commenting, HCS  Commercial Director Nigel Finney said: “This has the potential to be a real game changer for the composites industry.   We are very excited about the significant improvements in thermal and mechanical performance of graphene enhanced carbon epoxy prepreg structures and look forward to further developing a novel generation of carbon fibre  epoxy prepreg materials. We believe we are on the verge of a whole new range of graphene based polymer nanocomposites with some exciting and unique properties, which we believe will be of significant interest to the composite market always looking for enhanced performance.”
Nick Smith Technical Director of SHD Composites Ltd added:  “As part of our commitment to remain at the forefront of composites technology we feel that it is vital to explore the benefits that graphene can bring to our products. We see great potential in this exciting material to enhance the performance of our range of component and tooling materials.”
Please visit us in Hall 6 at Booth C54