Talk Composites - The Forum for Advanced Composites

Kayak heel rest and seats

http://www.talkcomposites.com/Topic18912.aspx

By panda - 8/3/2015 3:08:50 PM

Been making up a mold for a racing kayak heel rest and a seat and thought I would post up my progress here. The images are not the best quality but hope you get the idea.

http://www.talkcomposites.com/Uploads/Images/dc04f156-efc6-4fa2-ba13-5f41.jpg     http://www.talkcomposites.com/Uploads/Images/1ceefa4b-452f-42b2-8828-04e3.jpg



The front and back of the original made out of glass.  I'm going to make some adjustments to this so that it will come out the mold easier.  I flanged this up with some old mdf board and waxed it with some filleting wax around the edges to seal it.

I forgot to take some pictures of the plug flanged but I backed up the plug with a homemade epoxy gel coat out of EC epoxy resin and fumed-silica.  This has given a nicy shiny finish to the mold surface and I am pretty pleased with how it turned out.

Layup of the mold was 100g glass tape, 200g carbon, 1mm spherotex core, 200g carbon, 100g glass tape.  This has given a strong mold if not a bit over the top.  

Bit expensive to complete large molds this way but hopefully they will last the course!  I will follow up in a few hours with pictures of the mold and the seat!

Tom
By panda - 8/4/2015 5:01:41 PM

Here is the mold for the above heel rest

http://www.talkcomposites.com/Uploads/Images/d045ae49-d5cb-4dd3-a534-d0e0.jpg  http://www.talkcomposites.com/Uploads/Images/dac4ec07-e074-415b-a3f0-5c5d.jpg


The whit sections are where I had to change the shape to make it easier to get the part out so filled the gaps with repair paste.  First part turned out okay but had a few cosmetic problems as I did it very quickly.

http://www.talkcomposites.com/Uploads/Images/08f008c4-a8b2-47e4-8c39-dafb.jpg


Second part to make was a new seat mold, here is the plug.

http://www.talkcomposites.com/Uploads/Images/8a94e8d6-5a51-4cd1-bb86-69d1.jpg  http://www.talkcomposites.com/Uploads/Images/a552b04e-3d5e-48e6-8bed-a856.jpg  http://www.talkcomposites.com/Uploads/Images/4c2b4d9c-0e91-42f0-b69e-f05c.jpg


I decided not to flange any of these parts, mainly because on laziness but also because they are not going to be vacuum.  I did fill in the hole on the bottom of the base with some mdf and seal it so that there will be no hole in the bottom.  We have had some problems in the past if its not trimmed properly after being made and it gets stuck in the mold and needs grinding out.

I used to same layup as before using carbon and epoxy to make these molds.

http://www.talkcomposites.com/Uploads/Images/32b60aac-3d80-428c-910c-997e.jpg  http://www.talkcomposites.com/Uploads/Images/5d486172-7ee9-4d74-a38c-8906.jpg  http://www.talkcomposites.com/Uploads/Images/b11d34bb-dd7c-414e-94a8-6bf4.jpg  http://www.talkcomposites.com/Uploads/Images/a156567b-c6e3-4c8c-bfdc-c17c.jpg


Again, there was a bit of damage when removing the plugs, that will teach me for skimping and only using one coat of wax.  Repaired with repair filler and polished.

The filler on the outside is where there was some de-lamination between layers, not normally a problem but there wasn't enough support so it was far to flexible to use to I ground off the backing plys and filled from behind.  I will glass over these for support sooner or later but it doesn't really need it and works fine now.

None of these are anywhere near as pretty as anyone else's molds on here but they seem to work fine.  I will up date in a few days when I have had a chance to make some more parts out of them!

Tom