Design and optimization of carbon fiber eight-wire lifter with exterior cladding structure

The UHV eight-wire lifter is an important tool in frequent use for the construction and maintenance of UHV transmission lines, which is made of titanium alloy and weighs about 40 kg. Due to high-weight, the work efficiency is greatly reduced. In this paper, the design of a lightweight UHV eight-wire lifter is proposed by using carbon fiber cladding structure. The effects of three factors on the maximum load-bearing load of the carbon fiber exterior cladding structural member are excavated through the failed experiment of the carbon fiber exterior cladding tensile and shear test pieces and the finite element progressive damage numerical calculation. The orthogonal experiment is employed to obtain the optimal cladding structure of the eight-wire lifter with a carbon fiber exterior coating cladding. After that, carbon fiber eight-wire lifter is developed and subjected to mechanical tests. The test results show that the performance of carbon fiber eight-wire lifter meets the mechanical performance requirements of eight-wire lifter. Compared with the titanium alloy eight-wire lifter, the maximum load-bearing load of the carbon fiber eight-wire lifter is increased by 20.5%, and the weight is decreased by 37.5%.