The products we commonly refer to as “carbon fiber products” are actually carbon fiber composite material products, made by combining carbon fiber filaments with a matrix material like resin. The primary manufacturing processes include:
- Hand Lay-up: Suitable for small-batch, large-sized products. It is low-cost but offers generally average quality consistency.
- Vacuum Bag Molding: An improvement on hand lay-up, it uses vacuum pressure to make the product denser and improve its performance.
- Resin Transfer Molding (RTM): Carbon fiber fabric is pre-placed into a mold, and then resin is injected. This is suitable for medium-volume production of complex structural components.
- Compression Molding: Uses prepreg (carbon fiber fabric pre-impregnated with resin) and forms the product under high temperature and pressure. It is efficient, offers stable quality, and is suitable for mass production.
- Filament Winding: Primarily used for manufacturing tubular and tank-like products, such as fishing rods and high-pressure gas cylinders.
- Pultrusion: Used for producing profiles with a constant cross-section, such as carbon fiber rods and grids.