Variable Thickness Composite Panel Frame
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional composite panels lack sufficient flexural strength while maintaining a low mass, which is essential for applications requiring resistance to deformation under load without excessive weight or cost.
Innovation Solution
The composite panels feature a rigid frame with thinner outer edges and thicker inner edges, bonded with sheet-like material layers and a structural filler in a chamber, providing compressive strength and enhanced flexural properties without significant weight or cost increase.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Strength
If conventional composite panels use uniform thickness construction, then manufacturing is simple, but flexural strength is insufficient while maintaining low mass
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies local quality by varying the thickness of the rigid frame across different regions. The frame has a first thickness at outer edges and a second, greater thickness at inner edges, allowing each region to be optimized for its specific functional requirements. Outer edges provide structural perimeter while inner edges provide additional support where needed, thereby improving overall flexural strength without uniformly increasing mass throughout the entire panel.
Solution Approach 2:
The rigid frame is segmented into distinct regions with different thickness characteristics. The frame is divided into outer edge portions and inner edge portions, each with specific thickness values. This segmentation allows the structure to distribute material strategically, placing more material where it provides the most structural benefit (inner edges) while maintaining lighter construction where less support is needed (outer edges).
2Weight of moving object
If panel mass is reduced to lower weight, then flexibility and ease of installation improve, but structural strength and load-bearing capacity deteriorate
Solution Approach 1:
The patent optimizes the mass-strength tradeoff by applying local quality through variable thickness framing. The rigid frame uses a first thickness at outer edges and a second, greater thickness at inner edges, concentrating material strategically where it provides the most structural benefit. This allows the panel to maintain overall light weight while having enhanced strength specifically where needed for load-bearing and deformation resistance.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent employs composite materials by combining the rigid frame with sheet-like material layers and structural filler. This composite construction allows each material to contribute its strengths: the rigid frame provides structural framework, the sheet-like materials provide surface integrity and additional strength, and the structural filler provides compressive support. Together, they achieve high strength-to-weight ratio that would be difficult to accomplish with a single material.
3Strength
If sheet-like material layers are added to rigid frame, then flexural strength and surface quality improve, but manufacturing complexity and cost increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges the rigid frame with sheet-like material layers into a single integrated composite panel structure. The sheet-like materials are bonded to the rigid frame to form a unified assembly where the frame provides structural support and the sheets provide surface integrity and additional strength. This merging approach, while adding some manufacturing steps, creates a cohesive product that achieves superior performance characteristics.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent utilizes composite materials by combining rigid frame construction with sheet-like material layers and structural filler. This composite approach allows each component to be manufactured separately using optimized processes for its specific requirements, then assembled into a final product that achieves performance levels difficult to obtain with single-material constructions.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The solution results in composite panels that are strong, lightweight, and aesthetically pleasing, offering improved flexural strength and antimicrobial efficacy while reducing mass, suitable for various construction industry applications.
Implementation Method 1
A structural filler is disposed in the structural filler chamber to provide compressive strength between the sheet-like material layers
Implementation Method 2
a first sheet-like material layer is bonded with a first (bottom) side of the rigid frame, and a second sheet-like material layer is bonded with an opposite (top) side of the rigid frame
Data Source
AI summary
A composite panel exhibiting high flexural strength while reducing mass as compared with conventional composite panels is provided. The improved panel includes a rigid frame having outer edges defining a perimeter of the panel and inner edges defining a perimeter of a structural filler chamber, wherein the frame has a thickness at its outer edges that is narrower than at its inner edges; first and second sheet-like material layers bonded to opposite sides of the rigid frame to define, together with the inner edges of the rigid frame, a volume of the structural filler chamber; and a structural filler disposed in the chamber to provide compressive strength between the sheet-like material layers.