Production Technology chair | Productietechnologie | Materiaalonderzoek | University of Twente | Composite Research

Mission

Industrial manufacturing needs to be competitive to persist, often on a global market. Competitive products often demand the edge in manufacturing technology. This is certainly the case with lightweight materials, like fibre reinforced composites and light alloys.

The properties of these materials are closely related to the way they are manufactured. The understanding of this relation is therefore essential in a successful engineering design using these materials.

Research in the Production Technology group addresses the engineering issues of new processes related to lightweight materials, and their related performances. This means that the research topics cover the whole lifetime of a product.

Recent Publications

Recent Developments

graduation of Ramona Sitohang

January 27th at 14:30 Ramona Sithang will have her promotion at the UT as a digital event. During her PhD she investigated the 'Effect of in-plane waviness defects on compressive failure of thermoplastic composite laminates'. You are all welcome to support Ramona during this online defense!

Graduation of Erik Krämer

November 4th is the day our valued collegeau Erik will defend his PhD thesis entitled: 'The formation of fiber waviness during thermoplastic composite laminate consolidation'. We are happy to announce that it is once again possible to attend the defense as a 'real' live audience in the 'Berkhoff-zaal', Waaier Building at 16:45, be there!

research program 'enlighten' awarded

The research project ENLIGHTEN (Enabling Integrated Lightweight Structures In High Volumes) aims at ‘Reducing CO₂ emissions by making vehicles lighter’. Production Technology Chair prof. Remko Akkerman is launching this new research programme as part of the Perspective programme and has been awarded a grant of over €6 million.

The lighter a vehicle is, the less fuel it consumes and the less CO₂ is emitted. Lightweight materials that are strong enough to ensure passenger safety are also popular among manufacturers of cars and aircraft. Thermoplastic composites – fibre-reinforced plastics that soften when heated – are light, strong, easy to work with and easy to recycle. Certain components in aircraft fuselages and wings are already being made from this relatively new material. However, they are not yet in wider use.

The aim of ENLIGHTEN is to find a way to produce reliable entire structures using this material (in a predictable, reproducible and cost-effective way).

Perspective is a programme that challenges scientists to establish innovative new lines of research that can have a genuine economic and societal impact. Consortia are then formed that involve partnerships with the business community and social organisations. The programme has been set up by the Dutch Research Council (NWO), and the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate has made €22 million in funding available for it. A total of six consortia are being set up in the Netherlands, with 138 companies and social organisations contributing a total of €10 million of their own funding

Enlighten Participants: Airborne, Airbus, Aniform, Autodesk, Boeing, Boikon, Bosch, Cato, Composites NL, DSM, DTC, Engel, e‐Xstream, GKN/Fokker, HAN University of Applied Sciences, Saxion University of Applied Sciences, JLR, KVE, M2i, Province of Overijssel, SAM|XL, SET Europe, Solvay, Delft University of Technology, Eindhoven University of Technology, TNO‐BMC, Toray Advanced Composites, TPRC, University of Twente, University of Warwick, Victrex.

Graduation of amin zaami and mohammed Hosseini

This January 21st, not one, but two of our PhD students will defend their thesis. Both Amin and Mohammed have been working on the laser-assisted tape winding (or placement) process, as part of the EU funded ambliFibre project. Unfortunately, due to Covid-related regulations, the defenses will be online only and are accessible via this link.

Amin Zaami's defense of his thesis: "Development of fast local analysis tool for optimized laser assisted tape winding" will take place Thursday January 21st at 12:30

thesis cover zaami

Mohammed Hosseini's thesis: "Towards an accurate process design tool for laser-assisted tape winding" will take place Thursday January 21st at 16:30.

thesis cover hosseini

News Archive
GRADUATION OF OZAN ERARTSIN
On May 15th, our valued PT-member Ozan defended his PhD thesis on the 'Time-dependent, matrix-dominated failure of continuous fiber-reinforced thermoplastic composites'. In a unique online-only session, Ozan sucesfully defended his work performed in the past four years. A party was promised to take place at a later moment, so we stick around to learn more. Congratulations!

thesis defense of logendra dilli
Next February 14th there is scheduled the PDEng defense of L.K. Dilli, a.k.a. Logan! The work is entitled 'Design and Development of a Tailored Blank Manufacturing system for Stamp Forming Process. You are invited for the following program:
12:45 Public introduction, NH115
13:30 Machine demo, WH123

Ton bor has meeting with abraham
Our dear colleague dr. Bor had a brief meeting with Abraham (content not disclosed). We congratulate Ton with reaching the fantastic age of 50 and wish him many more and wise years to come!

Upcoming: thesis defense of Guillaume Vincent
For the past years, PhD student Guillaume Vincent has been shredding and mixing thermoplastic composite material. He will present his work on Recycling of Thermoplastic Composites Laminates; the role of processing, on Thursday October 3rd. Start of the ceremony is at 10.30 in Waaier building, be there!
new staff member martin luckabauer
New group member Martin started April 1st as an Assistant Professor and will be responsible for Material Science teaching as part of the recent UT-VU collaboration. Martin has wide international experience and his main expertiese lies in various types of metals. Welcome aboard!
Upcoming: thesis defense of Tjitse Slange
Our TPRC stationed PhD student Tjitse Slange will present and defend his work on Rapid Manufacturing of Tailored Thermoplastic Composites on Friday March 8. Start of the ceremony is at 14.30 in Waaier building.
upcoming: thesis defense of Johan van Ravenhorst
On Thursday September 13th, Johan will defend his work on 'Design tools for circular overbraiding of complex mandrels'. This work led to the development of the (award winning) Braidsim software package. Be there at 14.30 in the Waaier!
upcoming: thesis defense of Thijs Kok
PhD student Thijs Kok will defend on September 6th. The thesis is entitled: 'On the consolidation quality in laser assisted fiber placement: the role of the heating phase'. The work of Thijs was mainly performed at the Thermoplastic Research Center, TPRC. The defense starts at 14.30 in Waaier building at the UT!
new staff member nick
As of February 15th, Nick Helthuis has joined the PT group as lab technician. You can find Nick in the microscopy and preparation lab, as he will be responsible for both. Nick is a former student of Saxion University of Applied Science, during his graduation project (performed at the UT!) he worked on a reproducible production process of Elium, a new thermoplastic resin.
Welcome Nick!
New staff member wouter
As of this January, Wouter Grouve has joined the PT group as an assistant professor. Wouter has several years of experience in researching the influence of the manufacturing process on the properties of (thermoplastic) composites.
Welcome Wouter!!
Picture of the month
Baptiste Riondet finalized his internship at TPRC/UT about 'The effect of crystallinity on performance of (woven) carbon/PPS composites' and obtained this remarkable picture of the fracture surface of such a carbon/PPS composties. At the center of the picture, cavitations are located in an empty fiber bed.
upcoming: thesis defense of francisco sacchetti
On Thursday September 7th, PhD student Francisco will defend his research work on 'Interlaminar toughness of fusion bonded thermoplastic composites'. The work of Francisco was mainly performed at the Thermoplastic Research Center, TPRC. Be there at 14.30 in the Waaier!
Ismet baran receives NWO Veni grant
Our dear colleague Ismet receives this personal grant to boost his research on the production process of composite wind turbine blades. Congratulations
Martina Tjapkes celebrates 25 year anniversary at ut
On July 1st, our dear colleague Martina, secretary of the PT group, is celebrating her 25th anniversary at Twente University. Congratulations!
universiteit van nederland: ton bor lectures on metals & car design
As of May 31st, an online lecture (in Dutch only) is available of Ton Bor explaining the basic principles of selecting a proper metal while designing your car. The lecture was part of a series of engineering lectures, also videos of MS3 colleagues Jurnan Schilder and André de Boer are available. Please refer to this website for the video.
Bert vos celebrates 25 year anniversary at ut
Our dear colleague Bert, lab technician in the PT group, startet at UT already back in 1992. Ready as always, Bert is already working on the next 25-year period. Congratulations!
new project: towards advanced 3d printing of elastomers
After succesfully definding her thesis, Shaojie Liu (Lily) started a 1 year post-doctoral project in colaboration with the Elastomer Technology chair within MS3. Lily will work on a model to describe additive manufacturing of elastomer/rubber products requiring vulcanization. Challenges are found in selecting the right material composition, supply system, and vulcanization behavior to achieve a printable material. Proposers of the project are Wilma Dierkes, Ton Bon and Laurent Warnet.
upcoming: shaojie liu thesis defense
Shaojie Liu, better known to us as Lily, will defend her thesis, entitled "Friction Surface Cladding of AA1050 onto AA2024" on the 14th of December. Her work opens up the way to a new additive manufacturing process. It followed on the work by Arnoud van der Stelt, and was also supervised by Ton Bor and Bert Geijselaers.

website maintenance (OCT/'16)
The PT website has recently been converted to the new UT layout. Some sections might still be in the old design or turn out to be obsolete, it will take some time before the new website is fully finished.
Mohammed Iqbal Abdul Rasheed defended his PhD thesis on Friday the 15th of July 2016
The award winner Mohammed Iqbal Abdul Rasheed, daily named Iqbal, finalized his UTwente and TPRC PhD route on the 15th of July by defending his PhD thesis ‘Compression molding of chopped woven thermoplastic composite flakes’. This thesis was performed within TPRC, in close collaboration with the TPRC partners. Iqbal pursues his career at the University of Twente as a PostDoc. Be prepared to hear more of this young talented man!
Erik Krämer wins ticket to SAMPE Europe
Erik, an MS3 Master student performing his final assignment at TPRC, has won during the SAMPE Benelux meeting one of the 2 tickets to the SAMPE Europe meeting. His presentation on shape distortion in overmolded thermoplastic stamp formed composites was appreciated for its relevance and academic depth. Erik, left on the following picture, is receiving the trophy from Ferrie van Hattum, Professor at Saxion’s Lightweight Structures chair. We all congratulate Erik for this unique achievement within the framework of a Master assignment!
Leon Govaert Professor ‘Mechanics of Polymeric Materials’
Leon Govaert, Associate Professor at the TU/e, will strengthen the research activities within CTW, as Professor leading the chair “Mechanics of Polymeric Materials’ at the University of Twente from the 1^st of December 2015. This chair, supported by DSM, will focus on the long-term failure behaviour of thermoplastic based composite materials. The first PhD student to start under his supervision, Ozan Erartsin, will start on the 1^st of April.
In Memoriam: Titus de Haan
On the threshold of the new year, just before finalising his study, our student Titus de Haan suffered a fatal accident in Australia.Titus came to the University of Twente after obtaining his degree in Automotive Engineering at HAN University of Applied Sciences, aiming to improve his theoretical skills. His interest in lightweight constructions directed him to the specialisation Production Technology in the Master’s programme Mechanical Engineering. We got to know Titus as a down-to-earth, enterprising student with excellent teaching qualities. His Master's thesis project at Cato Composites Innovations was close to being finished. He chose for an adventure in Australia before completing his study in Mechanical Engineering. To our regret, Titus was kept from taking this next step in his life.On behalf of staff and students of the faculty of Engineering Technology, programme of Mechanical Engineering we wish those near to him immense strength to cope with this terrible loss.
Prof. dr. Geert Dewulf, dean faculty of Engineering Technology
Prof. dr. ir. André de Boer, programme director Mechanical Engineering
Prof. dr. ir. Remko Akkerman, research director TPRC, chair of Production Technology
Dr. ir. Laurent Warnet, supervisor, chair of Production Technology
Emiel Drenth to defend his PhD thesis on Friday the 11th of December 2015
Emiel Drenth will finalise his UTwente PhD route on the 11^th of December by defending his PhD thesis ‘Towards condition based asset management of uPVC pipes’. This thesis lies in the line of the lifetime assessment related research first reported by the PhD thesis of Roy Visser.
Ulrich Sachs to defend his PhD thesis on Tuesday the 16th of December 2014
Ulrich Sachs will finalise his UTwente and TPRC route on the 16th of December by defending his PhD thesis ‘Friction and bending in thermoplastic composites forming processes’. This thesis lies in the line of the press-forming related research initiated by Remko Akkerman, which has led to the thesis of Edwin Lamers, Sebastiaan Wijskamp, René ten Thije and Sebastiaan Haanappel. It is worth adding that this thesis was accomplished within TPRC. The multi-talented Uli will continue his career within TPRC (12-2014)
Andriejus Demcenko to defend his PhD thesis on Thursday the 23rd of Oktober 2014
Andriejus Demcenko will finalise his PhD next 23rd of October by defending his PhD thesis ‘Development and analysis of noncolinear wave mixing techniques for material properties evaluation using immersion ultrasonics’.

Arnoud van der Stelt to defend his PhD thesis on Thursday the 28th of August 2014!
Arnoud van der Stelt will finalise his PhD next 28thof August by defending his PhD thesis ‘Friction Surface Cladding; Development of a solid state cladding process’. The work reported in his thesis was supported by M2i, and fits within the research area of Friction Stir Welding led by Ton Bor. The work of Arnoud was supported by both the Production Technology group and the Applied Mechanics group of the University of Twente.

12th International Conference on Flow Processing in Composite Materials (FPCM 12)
The 12th International Conference on Flow Processing in Composite Materials (FPCM 12) will be held from 14th – 16th of July 2014 at the University of Twente, Enschede, the Netherlands. The conference presents the progress in the field of composite materials manufacturing and provides a forum for discussion between academia and industry. The conference is organized by the PT-group. The abstracts received, indicate that the conference receives a lot of interest from research groups from all over the world. The preliminary program can be found here. Registration to the conference as a visitor is still possible. Please have a look at our FPCM 12 website.
Please do not hesitate to contact us if you have any questions about the conference!

Wouter Grouve wins the 2014 Esaform PhD prize for industrial research
Wouter Grouve has been awarded the 2014 Esaform PhD Prize for Industrial Research at this year’s Esaform conference in Finland, 7-9 May 2014. Wouter won this prestigious award for his PhD research project on Laser Assisted Tape Placement of thermoplastic composites, as part of the EU Clean Sky programme, carried out within the Production Technology group at the University of Twente. The jury was impressed by his broad area of expertise (structural dynamics, fluid dynamics, fracture mechanics, thermal engineering, polymer engineering), the originality of his ideas, the thoroughness of his approach and his productivity. He presented a summary of his work as a plenary lecture on the 9th of May. Wouter is linked to TPRC since 2012.

Johan van Ravenhorst wins JEC Innovation Award 2014
Johan van Ravenhorst has won de prestigious JEC Innovation Award 2014 in the category ‘Simulation’. The JEC is the largest composite fair in the world, held yearly in Paris. Johan received this award for BraidSim, a software tool which enables a fast running simulation of the overbraiding process. The picture below left shows the stand at the JEC Johan designed to present his work. Besides, Johan receives his award from the Dutch Minister of economic affairs Mr. Kamp.
Ted Ooijevaar to defend his PhD thesis on Friday the 7^th of March 2014!
Ted Ooijevaar will finalise his PhD next 7thof March by defending his PhD thesis ‘Vibration Based Structural Health Monitoring of Composite Skin-Stiffener Structures’. The work reported in his thesis started from a Master project, and grew within the European project CleanSky. Supported by both the Production Technology group and the Applied Mechanics group of the University of Twente, Ted has developed a methodology to detect damage in a composite structure by analyzing using the changes in dynamic characteristics. Noteworthy is the grow in TRL to a level 5 of this technology. See Also article on UT site
Production Technology wins JEC Innovation Award 2013
Production Technology wins the JEC-americas Innovation Award 2013 with the EU project FIBRECHAIN. FIBRECHAIN, led by Fraunhofer IPT and representing 18 partners from 7 EU countries, work on the development of an integrated process chain for the flexible and automated production of composite products in small and medium lot sizes. The project results can improve the production of 3D-shaped, multi-layered products based on fiber-reinforced plastics (FRP) by reducing costs, gaining a better resource and energy efficiency, and more flexibility.

Main project actors within Production Technology are Bert Rietman, Laura Vargas, Ivo Vroojink, Muhammad Niazi, Johan van Ravenhorst and Remko Akkerman.

Muhammad Niazi wins the ESAFORM PhD Prize for Industrial Research
Dr. M.S. Niazi has been awarded with the ESAFORM PhD Prize for Industrial Research. He successfully defended his PhD last year in December from the Faculty of Engineering & Technology, University of Twente.The ESAFORM PhD Prize for Industrial Research intends to distinguish a confirmed researcher/designer or a group of industrial researchers/designers, who have brought an outstanding contribution in the field of industrial materials forming. This contribution may lead to a (potential) innovation in design, control or performance of industrial materials processing.
The PhD of Dr. M.S. Niazi relates to continuum damage modeling for sheet metal forming applications in Advanced High Strength Steels (AHSS). Development of AHSS is an important step in reducing the automobile weight. However, plastic deformation induces damage in AHSS. Damage development is anisotropic by nature and shall be considered anisotropic for accurate failure predictions. In this research, anisotropy in damage has been classified into two categories; Material Induced Anisotropy in Damage (MIAD) and Load Induced Anisotropy in Damage (LIAD).
MIAD is related to the anisotropy in distribution and shape of second phase particles or impurities and is governed by void/crack nucleation. LIAD is related to the loading direction of the material. The phenomenon of MIAD was discovered during this research. This is the first research showing the occurrence of MIAD in AHSS. The Modified Lemaitre’s (ML) anisotropic damage model was developed to account for both kind of induced anisotropies. The model was validated with experiments.

Sebastiaan Haanappel will defend his PhD thesis on Friday the 12th of April 2013.
Sebastiaan Haanappel will finalise his UTwente and TPRC route on the 12th of April by defending his PhD thesis ‘Forming of UD fibre reinforced thermoplastics: A critical evaluation of intra-ply shear’. This thesis lies in the line of the press-forming related research initiated by Remko Akkerman, which has led to the thesis of Edwin Lamers, Sebastiaan Wijskamp and René ten Thije. It is worth adding that this is the first PhD Thesis within TPRC. After both a master and a PhD within the chair of Production Technology, Sebastiaan will continue his career within Aniform, our very favorite spin-off (03-2013)

Bo Cornelissen will defend his PhD thesis on Friday the 25th of January 2013.
Bo Cornelissen will finalise his UTwente route on the 25thof January by defending his PhD thesis ‘The Role of Friction in Tow Mechanics’. Tow mechanics is the key to refined composite processing simulations. Within this broad topic, Bo has focused on the inter-tow friction as well as the tow-mould friction in the dry state. After both a master and a PhD within the chair of Production Technology, Bo will continue his career at Teijin Aramid (01-2013)

PhD Wouter Grouve with distinction August 31st
Wouter Grouve successfully defended his thesis “Weld strength of laser-assisted tape-placed thermoplastic composites”. The committee was very satisfied with the quality of the research and the defense that he was granted the title with distinction. Dr. Wouter continues his career within TPRC. (08-2012)
Ted Ooijevaar visiting PhD at NASA
Ted Ooijevaar is working for a 6 month period at NASA Langley! A project has been defined with researcher at Langley and fits within his PhD project on Vibration based Structural Health Monitoring of composite structure.
Opening TPRC laboratory and visiting center
On Tuesday June 26, the partners in the TPRC ThermoPlastic composites Research Centre have opened the new TPRC laboratory and visiting center on the Innovation Campus in Enschede. Founding partner of TPRC are Boeing, Fokker, Ten Cate and UT-ProductionTechnology. Research director is Remko Akkerman. (06-2012) Readmore

Green Team Twente wins Shell Eco Marathon
Green Team Twente won the Shell Eco Marathon in the urban concept class with a hydrogen propelled fuel cell. This year the team, consisting of 11 mechanical engineering students, joined the competition for the first time. With great passion, enthusiasm and perseverance their UTmotive consumed the least amount of fuel. Laurent Warnet en Gert Jan Nevenzel of the Production Technology group assisted them with materials selection and manufacturing of the suspension wings; Ton Bor supported the team by guidance of the project. (05-2012)