Development of a concept for electrically conductive furniture panels

Tschannen, Christof; Thömen, Heiko (July 2020). Development of a concept for electrically conductive furniture panels In: Society of Wood Science and Technology International Convention (pp. 242-252). Society of wood science and technology

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The wood industry, in particular, the interior and building sector are affected by the digital transformation. As a result, furniture is required to additionally inhere special functions like integrated illumination while being flexible in positioning and re-arrangements. The focus of this master thesis is the development of a concept for a conductive furniture panel including the cable-free conduction of electricity and illumination using LED. Three options were investigated. Conductive laminates (1) and conductive panels (2) were pro- duced using hot-pressing. Conductive polymers (3) were produced using a micro com- pounder and injection moulding. The material combinations of wood or polylactic acid with carbon fibres or resin were investigated. The samples were analysed for their elec- trical properties and polymer composites were furthermore investigated using light mi- croscopy and scanning electron microscopy. The results for the conductive laminates and panels were promising and reached resistivities of 4.8*10-3 Ωm. Highly flexible positioning of a LED was possible, using the panels in combination with the LED fixation pin. The conductive polymers were found conductive only at high carbon fibre content with moderate conductivities. Connecting two conductive furniture panels worked well using a simple butt joint for the bench-scale model. However, further research is still required to finalize the concept as the material showed inhomogeneous blending and poor processability for the conductive panels and laminates. Both provide a feasible solution for a conductive furniture panel. The conductive synthetic polymers are not an option at this state.

Item Type:	Conference or Workshop Item (Paper)
Division/Institute:	School of Architecture, Wood and Civil Engineering School of Architecture, Wood and Civil Engineering > Institute for Materials and Wood Technology School of Architecture, Wood and Civil Engineering > Institute for Materials and Wood Technology > Furniture Development School of Architecture, Wood and Civil Engineering > Institute for Materials and Wood Technology > Composite Materials BFH Centres and strategic thematic fields > BFH Centre for Wood - Resource and Material
Name:	Tschannen, Christof and Thömen, Heiko
Subjects:	T Technology > T Technology (General) T Technology > TA Engineering (General). Civil engineering (General) T Technology > TH Building construction T Technology > TK Electrical engineering. Electronics Nuclear engineering T Technology > TS Manufactures T Technology > TT Handicrafts Arts and crafts
Publisher:	Society of wood science and technology
Language:	English
Submitter:	Heiko Thömen
Date Deposited:	13 Jan 2021 12:02
Last Modified:	04 Nov 2022 11:04
Uncontrolled Keywords:	carbon fibers conductive wood-based panels electrical conductivity furniture interior lighting wood-based panel
ARBOR DOI:	10.24451/arbor.14184
URI:	https://arbor.bfh.ch/id/eprint/14184