New guy to carbon fibre and the forum


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dr3bin
dr3bin
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Hey everyone,

I'm new to carbon fibre. Took an interest after looking through Carbon Mods and watching their videos, so I thought I'd give skinning a go as I have a few parts I'd like to carbon-fibre up

I have (what I class as) a 'fairly simple' shape. A spark plug cover for my car. First time I've ever skinned anything, so I knew it'd mess it up. Which I did. A load of times. However the finished product finally came out and it looks like this;



The major issues I have is the finish is rubbish. I didn't go up the grades of sandpaper long enough and you can see fine lines. There's little white dots in the resin which I believe are air bubbles. Hammering it with a low-temp heat gun didn't get rid of all the air, so it appears. Also the resin became contaminated as I re-used a brush (washed and soaked in acetone) with fresh resin for the final layer, but the resin dried as a complete fog instead of nice and clear. So about 8 hours of sanding pursued to get it to a semi-finished state, as above. You can kind of see the fogged resin along the bottom of the part. I've learnt from that to use a new brush for each layer.

However, my main gripe is how on earth do I prep the carbon fibre cloth to accommodate the bolt holes. On the above example, I skinned the part, done all the resin layers before drilling the holes through - starting with a small drill bit and working my way up. But, this messed it up as the part eventually chipped around the edges resulting in a poor finish, rather than leaving it with a nice edge to work on with a file to get a nice, flat edge. Took me about 30 minutes of drilling as I knew to take it slowly and carefully. 

I tried cutting the fabric prior to laying the resin, however this frayed the cloth and put it all out of alignment with itself. I can't re-use the part as the fabric is bonded to the part so I binned it

I'm getting pretty annoyed with this process as I want to get this part perfect so I can sell it to my car club. I know I can do it, I'm just missing knowledge that a training course or other, experienced people would be able to offer. Thus me joining up on here Smile

Any advice would be greatly appreciated
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fgayford
fgayford
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dr3bin (10/04/2013)
Thanks for your reply Fred

I've got a new cover on the way so I'll give your strategy a go and will let you know how things turn out Smile

I have a massive roll of 2/2 twill left over which I'm using as practice. I've quickly found that this stuff is difficult to use as it frays so much and it gets everywhere. When I'm done with this roll I'll be getting some of Easy Composites' "ProFinish" carbon fabric as there will be significantly less frayed material and I'm hoping it'll be easier to work with When skinning the tack of the black coat should grab the twill before it unravels?

Where did you get your carbon burr from? I have a few other parts I'd like to skin which have holes for bolts on, so something like that would come in handy as 'normal' drill bits don't do the job
It is listed on the Easy composites webstore. The first burr is in the rotory Perma Grit kit. By the way I got one of the Perma-Grit sanding boards and highly recommend it. It is a tool that I cannot do without.  

I've read on other sites that putting the part in the oven helps remove bubbles. I guess that's the same as blasting it with a heat gun / hairdryer though You don't need the oven, if you are at room temp with everything a heat gun is all that is needed.You are using skinning resin? Other resin is too thin and a waste of time.

Also - there's a YouTube video of some dude spraying acetone onto his part which removes the bubbles! So that's something I'd like to try out too. Maybe a combination of acetone and heat will remove the vast majority (if not all visible) bubbles?





Shaneer22, I'd love to get an infusion kit however as a hobbyist and newcomer to carbon fibre I lack both the space and funds to invest in one. I know I can get great results from skinning, (maybe not flawless parts, but still great quality) it's just practice and learning from others which will get me there

GO

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