Electrical current conduction and temperature distribution of 3D carbon fiber woven composites under fault currents

The fault current will flow through carbon fiber composites when an electrical power system is embedded in composite structures in aircraft. The widespread use of carbon fiber composites in aircraft made it essential to understand their electrical and thermal responses under fault currents for designing embedded electrical power systems. Here we reported the current conduction and temperature distribution of 3D carbon fiber woven composites under fault currents. The 3D orthogonal (3DOWCs) and angle-interlock woven composites (3DAWCs) were fabricated and studied with three electric field directions. Finite element analysis (FEA) models were developed to obtain the current density distribution, electro-thermal contribution, and temperature evolution. We found that the contacts between yarns greatly affected the fault current conduction. A 2% relative variation in electrical resistance was exhibited at the weft/current-injected yarn interfaces, significantly higher than at other interfaces. Additionally, these interfaces had the most significant thermal contribution. The heat generated in the current-injected yarn was conducted through weft yarns to form the final temperature field. The highest temperature reached 29.5 ℃ and 37.8 ℃ for 3DOWCs and 3DAWCs at 45° orientation, respectively, while the final temperature distributions remained unaffected by the electric field direction.