Polishing/treating prepreg parts


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quinn
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I'm curious if I should be using anything on my prepreg parts after they come out of the mold. Still waiting on my prepreg but did a wet lay test in my mold and the finish is excellent but I'm curious about polishing and uv protection. My parts will be exposed to sunlight and I would very much prefer to not clear coat. I noticed a couple products, one of them being easygloss polish and protect. Does this stuff work? Will it give a nice shine and actually protect from uv? Other thing is, the parting line on my mold is excellent, almost invisible on the part, but you can feel it. Not sure if I should maybe try a very fine grit on a block, like 2000 or so, but then would need to polish any marks out. The line is on a convex surface so should be able to hit it with a flat block and barely touch any of the part surface, but I'm sure there would be at least a 1mm or so wide line of sanded surface that would need to be polished back down. If I go that route, might be better to use a strip of epoxy sheet right on the seem in my mold to give something to sand and polish. Maybe better to not touch it and just live with feeling a line when you run your hand across it. 
Anyway, mostly just curious about treating the part after coming out of mold if there's no clear coat going on. 
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MarkMK
MarkMK
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If you attempt to flat a 'bare' epoxy-made part you'll lose the gloss and won't be able to regain it, even with fine grits and polish. The resin layer is just too thin, especially on pre-preg parts. The only practical recourse, if you did want to completely flat the parting line would be to clear-coat the part afterwards

Infusion offers a slight advantage in this respect, as you can use an in-mould coating, like EC's GC50, which would give you a surface that would be possible to flat and then restore the shine via compound and polish. 


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