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Abstract
Composite materials are often made by infiltration, that is, by injecting a liquid matrix between packed solid fibers or particles. We give here direct proof that molten copper, slowly infiltrated into a broad spectrum of preforms, displays in initial phases of the process universal scaling and fractal geometric features that are characteristic signatures of percolation-dominated flow. Implications are that the microstructure of infiltrated composite materials can develop over length scales that far exceed the average preform pore size, and that network models are pertinent in the simulation of composite infiltration processing.
Acknowledgements
This work was sponsored by the Swiss National Science Foundation, Project No. 200020-137685.
We gratefully acknowledge Mr Willy Dufour, Mr Raphaël Charvet, Mr Cyril Dénéréaz, Mr Claudio Bacciarini and Dr Noelia Rojo Calderon for their contributions in designing, building and perfecting the infiltration apparatus used in this work.
Supplementary Online Material
A more detailed information on experiments is available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/21663831.2014.948692.