Fabrication of continuous carbon fiber mesh for lightning protection of large-scale wind-turbine blade by electron beam cured printing

Wind-turbine blades are more vulnerable to lightning strikes as they lack a protection system for large-scale glass fiber reinforced polymer (GFRP) composite structures. A low-energy electron beam (EB) cured printing process for fabricating a continuous carbon fiber-reinforced thermoset resin as a non-metallic lightning protection mesh on a GFRP composite surface was carried out in this study. During the proposed process, a continuous carbon fiber mesh was printed through a Fused Filament Fabrication that integrates the rapid curing of an epoxy resin with low-energy EB irradiation. The printing process was analyzed and optimized by examining the correlation between the EB exposure dose and the printing height. Results from artificial lightning strikes showed that the printed carbon fiber mesh prevented damage, and the structure remained relatively intact with residual strength reaching 90.1 % at 100 kA maximum peak current. The protection mechanism was investigated using a high-speed camera, which revealed that the carbon fiber mesh spreads the striking current outside the laminate instead of penetrating inside.