Talk Composites - The Forum for Advanced Composites

Keeping "joined' fabric in place during infusion

http://www.talkcomposites.com/Topic5212.aspx

By SteveRielly - 3/6/2013 4:48:23 AM

Hi All,

I've searching through here on keywords, and didn't see this question.

I'm looking to make carbon fibre body parts, using the blue carbon weave, where there is a direction of the weave based off the centre line of the car.
So looking from the front at say the bonnet, the right side has its weave head up to the right, and the left off to the left.

I've seen the odd thread on how to cut the weave to have a clean finish, so the next hard part is lining up the blue and black of the weave in the right directions,
something I'm thinking will take a fair bit of practice, and many many expletives.

My next area of concern, is keeping the two parts joined in the middle, and not moving while the infusion process is taking place.
Now I haven't seen this done first hand, only the YouTube vids, so unsure of the amount of vacuum pressure felt on the fabric, and if there is enough to actually
move it out of alignment, or even separate the two pieces.

The final product would have the blue carbon on the surface layer, 'normal' black carbon layers, maybe kevlar-carbon for additional strength.

Thoughts? Would this even be an issue, or should I use a tape of sorts down the centreline between the surface and 2nd layer to stop things from moving?
By andygtt - 3/7/2013 4:18:50 PM

planning on doing my body panels in much the same way... however I will use normal weave pro finish carbon, it will be very difficult to get the coloured cloth to lay as you want as I don't think they do it in pro finish so it will move when you cut the edges.

I have used tack spray, but I have found it tends to make the part a little sticky in the mould. I am going to trial my front bonnet using the infusion resin lightly sprayed onto the part and then cloth layed in while tacky.

I dont like using gel coats as it means you have a scrap part if anything goes wrong as air will be trapped under the gel and be impossible to rectify. as a beginer I prefer the ability to be able to go to 'plan B'... also the amount of material involved with body panels makes a mistake very costly if the part ends up unusable.