A STUDY ON PERMEABILITY OF UNIDIRECTIONAL FIBER BEDS

Permeability crucial to resin flow was studied. Approximate solutions of Kozeny constant for regularly packed beds were developed for square and triangular cells in parallel and perpendicular flows. Network sys tem models for fiber beds which are irregularly packed were proposed. Validity of the models was checked through the experiments. Image proc essing technique was applied to find centers of fibers. Prediction of permeability is done by the application of network models using the ce nters of fibers. In two flow types, good agreement was found between e xperiments and predictions by the network models. Permeability of fibe r beds can be directly calculated by suggested models using the images .