Is this a FAIL? Surface of sheet not flat (cloth texture showing)


Is this a FAIL? Surface of sheet not flat (cloth texture showing)
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Barry Marsh
Barry Marsh
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Ok this is my first attempt at a resin infusion.Things seemed to go ok, no leaks and setup kept vacuum over the curing time.
The surface which should have a glossy finish seems to be flat on about 90% of the surface. The other 10% seems to be showing the weave as it is not filled in with resin. I am sorry but I do not know the name for this issue (does anybody know the name of this?).

The part seems rock solid, resin was degassed and the part seems correct on the bondable side of the p[art.

I used 375g 5HS 6k Carbon Fibre for the finished side and 300g +/- 45 Biaxial 3k Carbon Fibre for the layers in between, purchased from easy composites. I also used their IN2 Epoxy Infusion Resin,  SLOW.

The part I made is small, approx 100mm square, this is really just a test piece. I did try to pull the resin in kind of slow (sorry not very scientific) but I have a sneaking suspicion that it maybe wasn't slow enough.

I was thinking at one point maybe thats the kind of finish I should expect from the 375g 5HS 6k weave? Is it possible to get a flat surface and is this a fail?


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Hanaldo
Hanaldo
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Its really just very lean, you need to let more resin in. Really what's happened is you've infused a very small piece with quite heavy weight reinforcement, so the resin has 'race tracked' across the surface and reached the exit before it has fully penetrated the fibres. Infusion has a degree of lag. What you see happening on the back of the layup is slightly ahead of what is happening on the surface. This effect is worse the heavier the layup is. 

To tackle this, you need to allow some resin to flow out the exit and into the catch pot. This allows the resin time to wet-out the fibres without causing it to become excessively resin rich, but it does waste some resin. Its only necessary to do this for situations like you have here, small/heavy layups. If you were infusing a larger piece with the same weight, the infusion would somewhat regulate itself.
Barry Marsh
Barry Marsh
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Ok I think when I give this another go I’ll try to be a bit less stingy on the resin. I did admittedly stop it as soon as the infusion had finished. The infusing did go fast, even tho I did try to slow it very slightly

Thanks for the advice

Barry Marsh
Barry Marsh
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Thanks for the response Hanaldo. Yeah I’ll definitely try to be a bit less stingy on the resin. I did originally try to slow the infusion down with the little clamps but they were pretty finicky, I clearly didn’t slow it down anywhere near enough.
GO

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