Industrial/Facilities

Facilities, Equipment, and Other Resources Available

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Following is a summary list of fiber/film processing and testing equipment available to Industrial Members, and the CAEFF faculty contact.

Prof. Amod Ogale (ogale@clemson.edu)

Rheology

  • Shear rheometers for steady and dynamic measurements: ARES I
  • ARES-LS2 with extensional viscosity fixture
  • AR 2000 Rheometer
  • Rheometrics ACER Capillary Rheometer with semi-hyperbolic dies for effective extensional viscosity measurements

Fiber Spinning and Extrusion

  • Piston-type, batch fiber dry-spinning and melt-spinning apparatus
  • Lab-scale twin-screw 10 mm APV extruder
  • Lab-scale Haake 3/4-inch extruder with metering pump and temperature-controlled extrusion head
  • Lab-scale 1-inch biocomponent fiber extruder, with metering pump, temperature-controlled fiber extrusion head, secondary draw stage with heated draw rolls,
  • Rheomix-600 intensive batch mixer
  • Lab-scale wet-spinning system with fiber annealing ovens

Film Extrusion

  • 3/4” extruder with 4” and 8” dies to produce single-layer film
  • Metering pump
  • Temperature-controlled chill roll
  • On-line measurements available: velocity, temperature
  • DSM Xplore system to produce single-layer film
  • Temperature capabilities to 350 °C
  • Minimum 5 ml of polymer

 Film-Stretching System

  • Uniaxial and sequential/simultaneous biaxial stretching
  • Maximum stretching speed of 2 m/s
  • Computer-controlled stretching of 3X
  • Heating capabilities to 180 °C

 

Ultrahigh Temperature Fiber Treatment

  • Stabilization: Lab-scale fiber stabilization ovens (3)
  • Carbonization
    • Astro 1100 and 1000 carbonization furnaces, 2700°C capability)
    • Red Devil'” Lab-scale carbonization/graphitization furnace, 2100°C capability
    • Thermal Technology HP550 Ultrahigh Temperature Press, 10 tons, 2500°C

 MechanicalTesting

  • Computer-controlled MTI single filament tensile testing apparatus
  • ATS lever arm creep machine (24), temperature range to 800°F
  • Dynatup instrumented impact data acquisition system
  • Kawabata single fiber compression tester

X-Ray Diffraction

  • Rigaku On-Line X-Ray System with azimuthal scanning capability for crystalline orientation within carbon fibers

Optical Microscopy

  • Complete optical sample preparation equipment, including Buehler Model 11-1180 “Isomet” low-speed diamond cut-off saw Buehler “Ecomet II” Polisher
  • Olympus BX60, BF/DF/polarizing microscope with Mettler Toledo FP 84 HT DSC cell for simultaneous thermal microscopy and DSC with Image Pro quantitative image analysis

Electrical and Thermal Conductivity

  • Electrometrics EMI Shielding fixture EM2107A
  • Netzch LFA 447 thermal flash unit with axial and through-thickness fixtures

Spectroscopy

  • Renishaw System 100 portable Raman spectrometer and remote fiber optic probe
  • Renishaw System 1000 Raman Microprobe spectrometer coupled to Leica microscope

 Thermal Analysis

  • Perkin-Elmer DSC and TGA Pyris 1
  • Netzch 457 LFA Thermal Diffusivity Analyzer

Prof. Mark Thies (MCTHS@clemson.edu)

Separation Science

 Fractionation and Separation

  • Parr stirred reactor vessels (50 mL, 1-liter, and 2-liter sizes), equipped with impellers and high-torque motors
  • High pressure view cell. Designed and constructed at Clemson University.  A windowed, see-through view cell of the Jerguson-gauge type with temperature and pressure capabilities to 400 °C and 350 bar
  • High pressure, variable-volume view cells (2). Visual PVT cells with T and P capabilities to 190 °C/700 bar and 250 °C/700 bar (constructed at Clemson)
  • Two multistage, packed-column extraction units. Designed and constructed at Clemson.  T and P ratings of 400 °C and 210 bar.  For processing and fractionating lignin polymers with both conventional and supercritical solvents on either a batch or continuous scale; also for generating narrow mol wt cuts of these materials as precursors for fiber spinning

 Precursor and Polymer Characterization 

  • Waters Alliance GPCV 2000 gel permeation chromatograph (GPC). High-temperature, preparative-scale GPC of lignin fractions for mol wt distribution determination of lignin fractions
  • Bruker Daltonics Autoflex MALDI-TOF mass spectrometer. For determining the absolute mol wts of liginin species 
  • Field desorption mass spectrometry (FD-MS) and GC-MS; 1H-NMR, UV-vis, and FT-IR spectroscopy
  • Electronic temperature controlled box furnace with nitrogen or air purge
  • Buchi Rotary Evaporator
  • The laboratories are also equipped with chemical hoods, general equipment for experimental procedures (glassware, Schlenk lines, solvent drying system, vacuum ovens, forced convection oven, stirrers, hotplates, vacuum pumps, glove box, centrifuge, ultrasonic bath, thermo-regulators, and analytical balances).
  • Nicolet Avatar FTIR with ATR and DRIFTS
  • Renishaw System 1000 Raman Microprobe spectrometer coupled to Leica microscope
  • Wyatt Technologies dual Multi-Angle Laser Light Scattering and Quasi-Elastic Light Scattering (MALLS – QELS) instrument
  • Perkin-Elmer DSC Pyris 1 and TGA
  • TA Instruments SDT-Q600 Simultaneous Differential Scanning Calorimeter (DSC) and Thermogravimetric Analysis

Membrane Science

Faculty contact: Prof. Scott Husson (shusson@clemson.edu)

ÄKTA Purifier 100 with Desktop Control system and a system pump with four pump heads in two pump modules, mixer for precision gradient formation, variable multiwavelength UV-Vis detector, pH/conductivity flow cells and monitors, UNICORN software system, and fraction collector

Beaglehole “Picometer” phase-modulated multi-angle ellipsometer with response times on the order of 1 millisecond and adsorbed mass sensitivity on the order of 2 ng/cm2

Veeco BioScope AFM with contact mode, tapping mode, phase imaging, and scanning-in-fluids capabilities, integrated with an Olympus IX51 inverted fluorescence microscope

KRÜSS DSA10 contact angle instrument with Drop Shape Analysis System, four liquids, automated dosing, environmental chamber with constant temperature bath, and thin film sample holder.

Tekmatic PipeJet Nanodispenser

Hewlett-Packard 1100 Series HPLC with UV and IR detectors

Numerous low- and high-pressure filtration cells

Automated reverse osmosis and nanofiltration systems