Hello all

Planning my first project.. I have included some photosbelow of the part to be replicated. Having lurked for a while I was hoping todraw on some experience here.. i have the large mould & high temp laminatekit from EC....

Mould construction

• Would you build up the sides of the mould tomake the shape a complete ‘bowl’ and trim after, or using clay, construct anedge/flange following the contours of the shape..
  

Layup

• ·        I had planned in the first instance to followthe wet lay technique shown on the video. What would be the most pleasing tothe eye to lay the fabric.. i planned to use two pieces of fabric due to theshape, firstly cap the top of the cowing using a circular-ish piece and use aseparate piece of cloth to cover the sides.
• ·        Are there any issues with overlapping the cloth ..any special considerations in doing this,, will it look nasty.
• ·        How many layers of fabric would typically beused to achieve the same thickness at the sample in the photos. this will besubject to vibration and heat
• ·        Can i let each layer cure fully before addingthe next or should it all be laid in one sitting
• ·        Can something of this deep bowl shape be doneusing a Vacuum bagging. Is there anything on the web showing this type of shapebeing made this way.. all i have found is flat or shallow panels.

Thanks

Hey. I made a welding helmet shell and that turned out good. Well, being honest, first try was full of bridging (i did not massage the vacuum bag enough). Epic fail haha.

The second one was ok. And it has what I call "consecutive curves and corners", if it makes any sense to you. I had to increase vacuum pressure slowly while massaging the bag with a rubber rectangle to force fabric and bag in corners. The fabric was laid in one piece, no cut anywhere in the part area. 2 layers of 200 g/sqm 3k 2/2 twill were used.

Notice the vacuum infusion was made without any flow mesh... Yeah in Belgium we crazy people (Matthieu looks profesionnal tho haha)

Infusion was VERY slow, so the slowest hardener was used. I skipped the flow mesh cos it was too difficult to position in tight corners (hence the first part that failed). And it was also too long to do it properly with 100% certitude on how mesh would conform (yeah, in Belgium we lazy people too).

Hope it helps, and dont forget the pics

 



 


    A $1000 electronic device will always protect a 10 cents fuse