As the subject says....Is it possible to infuse a part with non infusion resin.  I have a part I would like to infuse this weekend but the company I ordered more resin from did not ship on time so I wont get the resin until

Monday. The part is fairly small and only takes 3-4 min tops to infuse with infusion resin. I was thinking maybe just add extra infusion mesh. I don't want to wast the material if it just won't work.   The resin I am using is not easy composites resin. I wish I could buy all my supplies from easy composites but it not cost effective. IF it matters which it might....I am using the 6mm tubing for my infusions.

Thanks,

     Dennis 

what Warren told me you can not do this as infusion resin like water and simply resin like marmalade it not gonna flow and fill everything.

Hi Dennis,

I reckon it really just depends on the viscosity. Is it low viscosity epoxy resin, because then It should work nicely. I used some local resin to infuse my last couple of parts and it was standard resin which can be used for wet lay or infusion. If you have the data sheet just post the viscosity at room temp of the mixed resin and then we can tell you if it would work.

Hi Dennis

Now what I am about to say is something I have not tried but have been told works. So its up to you.(do a small test and see if it works if you like)

1. I know a guy who infuses with regular polyester resin with matte and glass cloth. (not carbon but glass fiber) works for him.

2. I ordered some epoxy from LA, I talked to their tech help guy about viscosity. He said what some of his customers do out there to reduce viscosity was to add 8 % acetone to the epoxy before infusion. They were making car hoods and claimed this reduced pin holes as well as flow was increased.

I haven't tried this yet but will experiment when ever I get some time.

Hope this helps.

Fred  

I've used most resin for bonding laminating infusion etc. I've found that using the lowest viscosity resin is the way to go and use a working time of 3 hours depending on size the longer the open time it can saturate through the laminate,which helps with pin holes.

The important point to note is viscosity of the resin you are trying to infuse and its pot life.

For example our IN2Epoxy Infusion Resinhas a viscosity of 225 mPas at 25C.

Our HighTemperature Epoxy Laminating Resin has a viscosity of 450-650 mPas at 25C and has been successfully infused, albeit slower than IN2.

Even EL2Epoxy Laminating Resin which has a viscosity of 1000-1400 mPas at 25C will infuse eventually.

Much thicker and you will struggle to infuse at all.

The challenge comes in infusing a larger part.

Other than for high temperature applications where the specific HighTemperature Epoxy Laminating Resin is needed, I can't see a reason why you would want to infuse a random resin except perhaps using up old stock.

We would always recommend using a suitable infusion resin where possible.


Warren Penalver
Easy Composites / Carbon Mods - Technical Support Assistant

I would seriously recommend you do NOT use acetone.

Acetone breaks down uncured epoxy resins, so yes it may dilute it a bit lowering the viscosity but it will also destroy part of the resin meaning the parts may not achieve a full cure.  They may have been lucky and got away with it by not using too much but certainly not an advisable technique.

I would NOT recommend the use of any solvents for thinning a resin for infusion as there is noway the solvant can evaporate off and escape and as such you risk ruining the part.


Warren Penalver
Easy Composites / Carbon Mods - Technical Support Assistant

Thanks all for the replies.....I did not try it. I had plenty to do to keep me busy this weekend. (got 28 inches of snow). Plus was able to do some other things on the car that needed to be done. I should have the correct resin today and will make the parts I need this week so I have them for next weekend. The worst part of not being able to make the part I really needed was that I had enough resin but was 20grams short on hardener.

The viscosity of the two resins I have are:

Infusion resin  150cps,     Laminating Resin 600cps    So not sure how it would have worked but I didn't want to take the chance.

Dennis,