Abstract

Due to the great increase in the use of composite materials, there is a need to investigate and develop effective recovery, recycling, and reuse techniques. This technological challenge entails significant research efforts to solve the current problems to separate and reuse the components of composite materials. In this work, two alternatives have been studied to solve the environmental problems that the use of resins as a matrix of composite materials entails, since there is no sustainable recycling process after its useful life cycle. On the one hand, a thermomechanical reprocessing will be studied and on the other the viability of the chemical dissolution of the matrix. For both processes, the optimal conditions (temperature, time, solvent, and pressure) have been studied to allow reprocessing the material or dissolve the resin of the composite material to recover the fiber. Subsequently, for thermomechanical reprocessing, the technical feasibility of impregnating fibers during the reprocessing process in the hot plate press has been studied. And for chemical recycling, the feasibility that the recycled carbon fiber will be reused to make a new composite material.