Talk Composites - The Forum for Advanced Composites

Vacuum bagging gone wrong?

http://www.talkcomposites.com/Topic31690.aspx

By Dimitar - 1/17/2019 7:33:10 PM

Hi there,

My friend and I received help with regards to vacuum bagging from Paul at Easy Composites yesterday and I can't recommend him enough, valuable advice and very helpful!

It came time to de-bagging today and our finished product hasn't turned out as we expected. I've attached some pictures, what could we have done wrong?

We used some temporary adhesive so that may be the murkiness of the top-most layer, but along the edges of the part there seems to be just lines of glue. Could this indicate that the cloth wasn't properly pressed into all the crevices at the time of bagging, too much resin, wrong curing temperature? 

Last night when we got back home it looked like the bag was still under vacuum. We placed an electric blanket underneath and then covered the part with the breather cloth. I think it may have been better to use a duvet as it didn't seem too warm when I went in the garage this morning.

Any help would be appreciated!
P.S. we bagged at 5pm yesterday and de-bagged today at 19:00 having used the Fast hardener.
By Dimitar - 1/18/2019 11:29:48 PM

 
Matthieu Libeert - 1/18/2019 4:50:43 PM

Sure Paul helped you out in an excellent way but there is still a lot skill needed. There is still a big margin or error between verbal information (or watching tutorials online) and doing it before getting the good parts...you have to see it like a trial and error where you can eliminate problems each time you make a new part 

Thanks for the input guys. We are trying out again tomorrow. I will bring the part inside rather than leaving it in the garage. I've got a small room which I can leave a heater in running through the night, that should definitely help with curing

 
Hanaldo - 1/18/2019 5:31:56 PM
Ok. The Soric wont be helping your bridging issues here - you are trying to make it conform to too tight a corner. Make a template and cut the Soric so that it fits inside the component you are making and doesnt have to overlap onto the flange.

We will make sure to cut the Soric to fit the final part as much as we can which I do agree should help with any bridging.