Characterisation of carbon fibres recycled from scrap composites using fluidised bed process

A carbon fibre recycling process for scrap composites based on fluidised bed technology has been developed. This paper describes the recycling process and the characterisation methods used to analyse the quality of recycled fibre. They include: the measurement of fibre length distribution by image analysis; tensile properties by single fibre testing; and the examination of surface contamination and surface chemistry of fibre by SEM and XPS. Recycled fibres of up to 10 mm mean length were recovered and they retained ∼75% of their tensile strength, while the Young's modulus remained unchanged and the surface condition was similar to the virgin fibre.