Most of the kits I found included items such as Vacuum Chambers, gloves, vacuum lines, fiberglass materials and other things I just didn't need.
They also cost $500-$1200!
AirTech has one of the nicer sites out there with a LOT of different materials listed, so I sent an email to them explaining what I needed and inquired about purchasing small amounts for testing. They called me back early the next day and asked what samples I was interested in and then told me the items would be shipped the next business day!
I was floored - how cool is that!
So now I'll have most of the materials in hand to do a few tests while continuing to pay off some bills, take care of things around the house, purchase tools and prepare for the actual build.
As for Resin Infusion, I've been following the bulletin boards, reading up on anything I can get my hands on and watching YouTube videos over the last three years to learn as much as I could.
I do have a few test cases prepared. There is a requirement to have a certain thickness of solid glass in the beams but I do know that a full vacuum will compress the fibers, so I will do a straight strip with some stair-stepping from one to eight or ten layers and then check the final part thicknesses to determine how many layers will be needed. It will also give me some insight to how the resin flow reacts to multiple layers. I'll also split that test into zones for flow control familiarization. I'll also do a small double-sided panel infusion to see how that goes since that is the method I want to use for the bulkhead construction.
When the build starts for real, I'll be starting with some bulkheads before moving on to the beams. With that in mind, I decided it would be a good idea to build a mock-up of the inner portion of a beam assembly for some hands-on practice.
On my way to drop my daughter off at work, I found a TV stand and some dresser drawers someone put out to the road for trash pickup. I threw them in the back of the car and went home to take them apart to create a model. The inner section of the beam mold is very "busy" as there are many layers of glass reinforcements going in along with angle transitions and then some Carbon Uni thrown in to make it fun.
I'm curious if it might be possible to infuse the entire assembly in one shot? But I do believe that's a lot to ask from someone who's never actually DONE an infusion yet.
So anyway, here are some pictures of the model being built:
I'll finish the Beam Mold next weekend and pick up some blue foam panels from Lowe's to use as some test pieces. The blue foam panels are for home insulation purposes and will not be the same quality as closed cell Divinycell foam. As a result, they may not be vacuum tight - so I might have to end up putting a thin coat of epoxy to seal the foam surface. I'll try pulling a vacuum on a solid piece of foam before going that route.
As for Epoxy, I plan on contacting Endurance Technologies next week to see if I can get a gallon or so sent out.
No comments:
Post a Comment