Customised and integrated sole for cycling manufactured by 3d printing of continuous carbon fibre reinforced polyamide

  1. Esnaola, A. 1
  2. Morales, U. 1
  3. Iragi, M. 1
  4. Aretxabaleta, L. 1
  5. Aurrekoetxea, J. 1
  1. 1 Universidad de Mondragón/Mondragon Unibertsitatea
    info
    Universidad de Mondragón/Mondragon Unibertsitatea

    Mondragón, España

    ROR https://ror.org/00wvqgd19

    Geographic location of the organization Universidad de Mondragón/Mondragon Unibertsitatea
Journal:
Revista de Materiales Compuestos

ISSN: 2531-0739

Year of publication: 2024

Volume: 8

Issue: 6

Congress:

Type: Conference paper

DOI: 10.23967/R.MATCOMP.2024.06.03 GOOGLE SCHOLAR lock_openOpen access editor HANDLE: https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11984/14209

More publications in: Revista de Materiales Compuestos

eBiltegia. Repositorio digital de Mondragon Unibertsitatea: lock_openOpen access Handle

Abstract

Customised cycling soles are extremely complex to design and manufacture since the plantar pressure distribution and anatomical shape are specific for every foot. This paper explores the potential of topology optimisation and additive manufacturing of continuous fibre reinforced plastic. The highly abstract material distribution resulting from the topology optimization software was interpreted considering the additive manufacturing constraints for getting the detailed design. The selected printing strategy consisted of concentric fibre orientation to better fit load-paths, and the build-orientation aimed to maximise the fibre content, resulting in 30 hours for printing each sole. Regarding the specific stiffness at the hallux and the hell, the new soles are at least 60% higher. Therefore, it has been confirmed that the proposed approach is a powerful tool to design the cycling shoe adapted to the local stiffness of each foot.