Analysis of vacuum infusion resin transfer molding with resin distribution system

The objective of this study is to develop a model which can be used to predict the flow pattern in Seemann Composites Resin infusion Molding Process (SCRIMP) by computer simulation and to experimentally analyze the influences of various molding conditions and material variables on mold filling. A set of grooved SCRIMP experiments was carried out to explore the flow mechanism and to verify the modeling results. The control volume/finite element method (CV/FEM) was adopted to solve the flow governing equations. For large parts with many small grooves, it is impractical to carry out the CV/FEM simulation on a huge number of mesh points. Hence, a simplified leakage flow model was developed to accommodate this special case. The results from the leakage flow model agreed well with the experiments, as well as the results from the CV/FEM.