Abstract
There have been many publications on “3D Weaving”, and there are numerous patents on a variety of devices that may be used to make a “3D Woven” structure. The majority of the 3D woven products that are currently commercially available are formed by a 2D weaving process that is used to build up a preform with fibers oriented in three dimensions. Recent advances have lead to multiple insertion 3D weaving, i.e. 3D fabric formation with each process cycle, or multi-layers at one time. The 3Weaving™ process is a multiple insertion 3D weaving technology that is different from traditional weaving. These distinctions about the different processes will be detailed in this paper. Additionally, the economics, manufacturing and performance of 3D woven textile preforms for composites will be discussed. Problems and solutions in each of these areas that prevent the large scale production of advanced composites will be presented. The advantage of 3D textile preforming is the ability to take complexity and labor out of manually intensive and expensive composites fabrication processes, and put it in the relatively inexpensive automated preforming process.
