Production Technology (PT)

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)