Making real Carbon Fiber parts (at home)!
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- Опубліковано 22 вер 2023
- I'm upgrading my Voron - with carbon fiber! The Stealthburner toolhead has never looked better.
Thanks to Aurapol for sponsoring this video! Check out their PLA HT110 at www.aurapol.com/pla-ht110 and use code AURAPOL10 for 10% off
Printed on the Prusa MK4 go.toms3d.org/MK4
Based on the Stealthburner design github.com/VoronDesign/Voron-...
All the modified files on Printables www.printables.com/model/5914...
The materials I've used are all from shop.hp-textiles.com/ (who I can absolutely recommend), but also check out www.easycomposites.co.uk/ as they've provided invaluable learning material for this process through their UA-cam channel (and ship worldwide!)
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Everyone, YOU MUST USE A RESPIRATOR. I cannot overstate this. Make sure your enviornment is well ventilated. When using resin, make sure you have an Organic Vapor Catridge and a particulate filter. When sanding, cutting, and trimming carbon fiber, please use a P100 filter and make sure your respirator fits right. And probably do it outside. Carbon hairs are tiny tiny and a P100 particulate filter barely has the ability to capture them. Please please please do safety research and take every precaution!
And excellent video!! Thank you for sharing :)!
Use water when grinding and sanding to prevent the dust going airborne in the first place. When cutting fabric with scissors, avoid fast movement that will fluff short fibers into the air. Wear a mask too just incase, but this way the fibers don't travel very far so it's easy to clean up (I use a sticky roller)
I wanted to post this very same thing. Glad someone else did. This is dangerous, be careful cause your life depends on it.
Let's get this pinned.
Says the soy boy who doesn't like asbestos lung. Remember to double mask in your car guys!!!
Hi Thomas, i have some experience with carbon parts.
1. since you already have the vacuum pump and bags, dry stack the carbon and do it with the vacuum infusion process. You get much better results with higher fiber to resin ratio, and no air pockets.
2. when you put the resin on the finished part and it pooled to the middle, that was because you didn’t clean and degrease the part from the mold release, also you absolutely need to sand the surface so the new resin sticks to the hardened resin. Otherwise it could just pop off.
Thanks for the tips! I thought I did a decent job preparing the part for the topcoat, but I guess I need to be even more thorough.
And vacuum infusion is on the list of things to try 😉
@@MadeWithLayers I would add that vacuum bagging works great when the parts you are making are raised up like a mound rather than like a valley as you are not fighting the tension of the bagging materials against the air pressure on the outside of the bag in the corners of the mold.
I also have some experience with carbon parts. I would like to add 3 things to this:
1. I think another reason the clear coat seemed to go away in the corners, is because your corners were quite dry and sucked up the resin.
2. The radius of the corners you have is really small. The standard recommendation is to not go below 5mm. If possible, don't go below 10mm. The carbon fiber doesn't want to make such a tight radius. If you design with a smaller radius, the corners will either be dry or only resin, that often breaks of in the mold.
3. If it is a part that just needs to look pretty, you can resolve the dry corners with a few rounds of clear coat resin and sanding.
The resin topcoat issue can be contamination as others have said. It can also be the result of anime blush. The amine on the surface is water soluble so degreasers and thinners don't remove it. Washing with detergent and water removes it. Easy test is to pour water onto the surface and see if it forms a film (good) or if the water beads (bad). And finally, if you have really small holes in the top surface, it may be near impossible to clean those holes, or what is in them. That also causes the topcoat to avoid those holes.@@MadeWithLayers
@@randomthoughtsandthings These were more valuable than others, I mean to me. Thanks everyone for your contributions!
Easy Composites Ltd has by far the best videos about proper techniques for very high quality production. But this kind of videos are really good to show what can go wrong in process like this and to show the methods for not having all of the fanciest tech, but for hobbyist to reach "good enough" parts. GJ 👍
I'll second that. If memory serves Easy Composites found PETG was the best for making moulds (for part extraction purposes) and that the hand pump with those vacuum bags gives way to much vacuum (about 80%) but that a home vacuum cleaner gives almost perfect vacuum at (20%).
I agree! I binge watched all their stuff.
Use blue painters tape on the cut line of the CF weave before cutting it. It'll keep everything in place and keep from making a mess of the loose fibers
Good tip
One tip. You could try using a stabilized carbon fabric. That way it maintains its structure as its cut and laid into the mold. You wont get those edges that want to pull apart.
You mean prepreg. Nah dude, I know it's good. It undoubtufully is! It's expensivetho. And I already keep my food, in the fridge. It's a real hassle to deal with that, even tho yea the cut and lamination part is smooth and the final result is definitely more guaranteed even than infusion.
@@bonovoxel7527 No, I mean stabilized carbon fiber fabric. It has separate threads running through it to hold the weave together, even when cutting or draping it in/ over a mold. If i wanted to suggest prepreg, I would have said prepreg.
I misunderstood you bc of english (I'm italian) and lack of knowledge maybe, so thanks for the tip. Are those marked as "ProFinish" at Easycomposites?
In your experience might it be a good idea to use some carbon tissue specific spray glue to hold dry tissues in place?
@@gergorian
a bit testy, don't you think. I suspect many people don't know the difference between "stabilized" and regular carbon fiber fabric. Not everyone has english as their first language. @@gergorian
Let Glue Dry reference to Laura’s channel was a nice touch 👌🏻 Incredible job, as always.
a quick way to re-finish the part surface would be to sand it down till flat with your sanding sponge, then use a gloss PU spray instead of brushing it on. It should provide a very even surface and is what I use whenever I make mistakes with my CF parts
Why not making a negative stamp, that fits inside the laid carbon fibre, so it compresses the shape nicer in the corners while under vacuum. Of corse some vent holes/channels would
need to be designed in to the negative.
That's what I was thinking too, a full blown stamp would probably help a lot!
Actually this is a common workflow when working with carbon fiber. A while ago I have seen a video covering this whole process:
ua-cam.com/video/25PmqM24HEk/v-deo.html
Funny enough, that guy also uses 3D printed molds.
there's actually a video on that easy composites channel of them doing exactly that. bicycle brake handle I think.
That's a different process that you do with loose fibers instead of woven ones. Forged carbon!
I was thinking the same thing when he started stuffing the mold with fabric before putting it in the vacuum bag. That with some weight on it would help tremendously.
For that last coat you should really use clear coat, not resin. It will protect your resin as it doesn’t do well with UV.
Was going to say the same… on my motorcycle I had all my raw carbon parts professionally clear coated with a UV polyurethane. The parts come out looking beautiful and well protected.
Legit point there. Iirc its been ages when I did speaker housings from fiberglass to my car I think one fiberglass dude said that pretty much whatever you do, don't try to add resing to part again after it's cured. I suppose it might work after rough sanding, but well if fibers don't have enough resin, it's pretty much ruined job anyway. I think those would apply to carbon parts as well. Should actually try that stuff again someday. It was quite fun process, though the fumes and sanding are annoying part to handle.
Thanks for another fun video Tom. For the last step instead of clear coating with resin how about using 2-part automotive clear coat? You can get the “touchup” spray cans for cheap. They’re crystal clear and hard wearing.
Tom, total newbie here, I just did few fiberglass parts for my old motorcycle, but I think a friend of mine that used to do carbon fiber for nautical items used a gloss first layer of resin called gelcoat. It's thicker and gives it that deep glassy smooth finish to the parts
But FG is twice as heavy half the strength. So loading up with gel coat adds weight which reduces value of CF
FYI, you could probably line the mould with a thin layer of latex. There is some special latex for vacuum forming which is designed to release. It can be applied with a brush and should make the resin not stick to the mould while retaining all the details.
Great vid. Very helpful.
I do this for years for automotive stuff, using 3d printed molds, really awesome especially the "forged carbon" process.
Ah the good stuff! I like to tape the CFK with tape and then cut it so the edges of the mats stay in place. Also pretty overlooked is NFK natural fibers that are used mostly in Ski making because they have a nice flexibility. Together with organic resin its slightly more environmentlly friendly, even if its still Sondermüll.
Interesting video. When we needed to make repairs to fiberglass aircraft, works on boats or whatever, we would put a piece of plastic down, put the fabric down, pour the resin on it then another piece of plastic and use a plastic squeegee to spread it into the fabric. Its easier to cut a shape when the fabric is wet. Peel one of the pieces of plastic off, put it in the mould (wet side down) and using a wooden stick or plastic stick push everything where it needs to be. Remove the second piece of plastic, make sure nothing shifted out of place then vacuum bag and suck it down! Very good video. Thank you.
Since looking at a 3D printer for hours on end while printing is mesmerizing adding a bit of bling makes it even nicer.
You can also do chopped carbon fiber compression molding as well. ("Forged Carbon Fiber") It's quite a bit messier, but you don't need to rely on the vacuum bag that way, and the printed part can be doing the compression work.
It would be curious to see some structural part of the printer redesigned in Forged Carbon Fibre and see how well it feels and performs, whether there's weight to be saved for a given stiffness.
That might just be the next process I try out! Works a lot better for interlocking with parts designed for printing than a thin shell from vacuum molding, too.
This here, it does seem a lot easier to do more complex parts and don't need the vacuum. This is a great video ua-cam.com/video/25PmqM24HEk/v-deo.html
@@MadeWithLayersyou could probably make the whole front part of the stealthburner out of forged carbon...
Especially with coarse fiber on such a small part with complex geometry ... compression mold for the win. some use a vise some use a press .. can even bag it as well
I love how you show the fails as well as the successes. I wonder if it would work if you use another 3d printed part on top of the carbon fiber instead of all the cloth, if its about breathing air you can make it meshed, so it would go mold > carbon fiber > part. it would help a lot with the pressing the corners and angles.
You should try out forged fiber. Doesn't have the same weave look but also looks super cool in its own way and should be easier since you won't have to vacuum bag.
You can also use Bondo or other brands of car body filler to help smooth the prints. It sands easily because it's made to do exactly that. It's also easy to see where you still have filler vs plastic coming through because it's opaque.
I am very seasoned, professional fiberglass laminator/mold engineer. A helpful tip for making small molds/plugs from printed parts is that you can mix wood putty with Acetone, (which you already have if dealing with these types of resin) and create a very soft putty that is extremely sand-able and just goes right into the imperfections of the print. Also giving yourself a few extra mils of thickness in the mold for the part could account for a spray on filler to naturally flow out most of the texture.
The easy composites videos make it look so much easier, it is good to get a more realistic demo :)
Fiberglass isn't actually heavier than carbon fiber . CF starts at about 90g/m2 (yes, there are lighter ones as well), where FG starts at around 28-30g/m2. As the fibers of FG are less stiff you can also get a nicer surface finish with way less pinholes than CF, although you lose the CF wow factor. Strength to weight ratio of CF is much better than FG (of course), but in this case it doesn't really matter.
You have sped up the curing time of the resin by holding the cup from the bottom and heating it up with your hand. And yes-it does make a difference!
To get a better outside quality of the part you can brush resin first (you can heat the resin a little to make it flow better, but it will set faster), wait for it to set a little, but still be tacky and then follow your process. That layer could be then polished to get better quality of the finished part due to the additional outside resin layer.
Another tip- when you are using a real vacuum pump and don't have the professional connector, put the pneumatic tube in a piece of sponge (kitchen one cut in half works well), then it sucks the air out more evenly.
Now here we go. 👍. 3d printing for composites. Easy Composites' service and videos are great.
Recently saw another video showing parts smoothing with baby powder and uv resin. It came out super smooth after a few coatings. Might be something to check into to prep the molds.
Where can I find this video? Sounds super interesting!
@@KensCounselingCouch ua-cam.com/video/KVf0mbBCygQ/v-deo.htmlsi=ngLLyDXAtl0FPuLP
The one I saw did many coatings, standings, filler primer, sanding, clear coats, sanding, clear coats, wet sanding, clear coats,... red hemisphere with a few details painted blue by the end.
@AndrewHelgeCox I should have said something about Thomas' reduced layer height for his molds in my initial comment. I was thinking it but didn't say it. The surface would take less effort if you start with a lower layer height initially. You may not even need the filler primer or other paint, just resin and baby powder.
@@4theloot638 How much lower than 0.1mm do you want to make it? And with thinner layers you gain new issues, such as worse layer to layer consistency.
Besides i think PLA is a bit of an issue, the way it pulls on layers which have different amount of material, that line which you always see on the benchy in the middle of the hull. I think HIPS is worth considering for tooling like this.
Very interesting! I think it would look a bit better if you block sanded it afterwards and then polished it. Like that you get sharper lines which will make it look a little bit better imo :)
Loved watching this, ive been interested in molding carbon fiber, vacuum mold process. I can't wait to try my hand at this. Thank you
honestly even your first attempt was amazing! For my own 3d printer, I just cut in slots to put non woven fibre in. I just super glued them but you can just straight up resin attach or glue a few fibres to specific parts of your print, this makes the process incredibly fast (10m)
I have a really awful low quality video about it on my channel lol.
It's the release agent that makes the epoxy bunch up and not to flow out to a even surface for you. Even if you clean the part Wich acetone you will have to sand the surface to get a good adhesion of the next layer of resin.
Good call on the rename for the time being, Thomas! Your name still being there is great for searching. I still find your videos by your name, but I like Made with Layers.
This is something that has been on my list to play with for a while, easy composites have some really great videos and and starter kits available
Make sure to get a respiratory and gloves and do any cutting and sanding in water so the fiber dust doesnt go air bound.
If you can send us the 3D files we’d love to take a stab at making this for you with some prepreg carbon. A video on how we would approach (we make automotive carbon parts) this part sounds really cool! If you’re down reach out and we can make something happen…
The files (step included) are all linked in the description. If you want to create a different mold that still fits the same modified toolhead part, you should be able to easily create a fresh surface model from the supplied trim pattern (though I can upload the exact one I used to Printables tomorrow as well)
Would it not be better to spray a lacquer on the finished part rather than trying to touch it up with resin?
Been working composites for 5 years. I always love to watch how others work. The nice thing about CF is that, once you learn it's nuances (and there are many), you can make anything out of it. Practice and watch a LOT of other folks videos. I, personally, have been doing carbon forging. Great fun. Amazing parts.
Yeah, it's expensive, but once you get used to it, you stop wasting so much cloth.
The only true downside is handing the cloth. Yes, loose fibers will irritate and burrow into skin. Use long gloves and a mask.. always when cutting raw cloth. Same with using power tools on CF.. mask up. CF powder in the air is very bad to breathe in.
While the initial investment may be fairly low I found that, at least in my case, it grew exponentially as I was constantly trying to improve the strength and quality of my finished pieces. After less that 6 months I had a vacuum bagging setup and now, after a little under 14 months, I have an autoclave and resin infusion system. That being said, it's still a great hobby and being as how I autocross and sim race it has.practical benefits
use a 2-part mold with drains and a vacuum bag it. Also, you can spray the carbon and with super 77 then use Vail fabric on the back
Tom, good job. at one point the carbon fiber part was looking very attractive. Very interesting process. Keep on making :)
what about making a two-part mold that keeps the shape well pressed?
Even just a translucent toolhead body out of clear resin would look good.....lots of possibilities ......ive been playing with 3d printed reverse molds lately, and they seem to work fantastically. Used amazing mold maker from joanne fabrics for mine
Looks awesome. Maybe a sprayed on clear coat will yield a better result for that top coat.
Instead of applying a second coat of resin spray paint the part with 1-3 layers of clear coat. It will fill in the gaps, spread out much more evenly and prevent your resin from becoming yellowish from UV.
Reason you got the uneven last layer of epoxy.
You need to wipe off the surface with warm water and a scotch brite spunge in order to remove some recidue that the former epoxy sweats out.
Then sand with very fine sand paper before putting on the final layer of epoxy.
A great way of using carbon fibre are these chopped fibres. They have a cool look and you can use them for smaller parts too.
Thanks Thomas, I'm inspired to give it a try.
Always think safety first!
Maybe using negative moulds and having a thin silicone layer on top of them to sandwich ... the silicone would require its own moulds too but the ease of use and reusablilty would outweigh the initial work if mass production was the end goal
Random thought, don't know how well it would work but you could print a male mold to put on top of the resin/carbon fiber layup to help hold the resin/fiber layup tight up against the female mold during vacuum processing. But if it sticks much good luck getting it demolded. :)
I work with carbon fiber for my job and I use 400 grit sandpaper to smooth out the resin then I clear coat that with cerakote (the parts are meant to be heavily handled)
"let glue dry" Laura would be proud.
love this content! would be interesting to see you try some forged carbon parts with 3d printed molds
Great job Thomas, so much work and struggle just to get that small part x)
Some ideas:
1. Manufacture the mold from ABS and brush or wipe away the layer lines with acetone. Use a soaked Q-Tip/toothpick for narrow areas.
2. Use light passes of an aerosol for the topcoat(s). This might resolve the uneven finish, and the variety of enamel/ceramic/resin/acrylic/composites/etc options available today for every use case (e.g. thermal insulation) is amazing!
3. Compress your filled mold via a 3D print of the part on top. You'll get better fill-material conformance with pressure from both the bottom *and* top. Break out the clamps!
4. Apply a viscous liquid (e.g. cutting oil) to the area where you're removing carbon fiber material. An oil wicks up dust more efficiently -- and sticks around longer -- than water.
Let me know if any of these are bad ideas. I'm no expert. Anyway, gorgeous result, Tom! the black/red combination is unsurprisingly good, and the texture makes for a sexy tool head. Now I'm off to buy some resin and carbon fiber...
try making the insides of forged carbon fiber, the two types of carbon fiber would look really good and the channel you mentioned does have videos on making forged carbon fiber parts with 3D printed molds
Definitely looks like a more artisanal process than 3D printing, but a good result is very cool. A worthwhile skill to develop, and like you said not quite as involved as metal fabrication.
This actually drove me into 3D printing. Molds. I was too pissed of how limitant can be obtaining your molds from already existing objects, and how to align them with a plane to reliably shape them. Which are usually designed and thinked for anything except vacuum molding, with corners and odd features...
And yea 3D printing is awesome! :D I have a whole new world to explore now!
(Yes, I have a BambuLab. It wouldn't be so amazing after just 1 month otherwise, I suppose.)
For those small parts i would prefer prepreg material. It is more expensive and you have to work with higher temperatures, but it is very easy to work with and the results will be much better.
is there a prepreg that can bake below filament glass transition temperature? I've though about the same but always get stuck on the baking part.
@@Deaner3D Yes, there are several prepregs wich cure at 80°C. PLA will not work, but PC, CF-PA, HT resin and perhaps ABS will work.
You've shown just how hard it is. Keep it up.
Hello Tom, once again a great and entertaining video.
One comment carbon fibers conduct electricity and since they are ~ 7 micrometers in diameter, they might get inside electronic devices and generate shorts. They can damage in particular power supplies. I would recommend working carefully specially around you printers ;).
we could always make carbon fiber parts with our $250 000 autoclaves
i feel like smoothing spray paint like filler primer would work fine for that smoothing step. maybe cheaper and more available than UV resin
Does anyone happen to know if this Aurapol PLA has more VOC's than normal PLA? It looks good, I might try it out.
I often impregnate the carbon fiber before putting it in the mold: Place it on a piece of plastic and put resin on the fiber. Especially the twill weave tends to "unravel" easily so I lay a second layer of plastic on top and then massage the resin in the fiber. Carefully pull the top plastic off and place the carbon, with the bottom plastic now on top, in the mold.
This gives me the best results when I want optical quality like for the part you made.
If you re-use a mold, always clean and put a new coat of PVA in the mold since you may pull out pieces of the PVA when demolding. I never used the thick PVA for 3D prints but I think you can just apply a thin layer of normal thin PVA.
To finish your part, do not use resin. Instead, clean the part (wash off any PVA that sticks to the part) do a light sanding and spray paint with a clear coat. That gives a much nicer finish.
Possibly rough up the surface of the clear coat then buff it with a rubbing compound/polish application to get it smoother?
Just an idea since you deliver information really well, heated chambers and high end engineering grade materials would be cool to so from you, with a lot of carbon fiber and glass fiber filaments becoming more common
Top coat works better if you just sand the part and apply a spray varnish (clear coat) instead of a new layer of epoxy. Results are much better.
You needed to wipe the amine coating off of the cured resin before you added more epoxy resin. Also it needed sanding because cured epoxy doesn’t stick well to cured epoxy. Trapped air is a big issue in a face down part getting more coats too but didn’t look like too big of an issue, just the first two.
Would love to see what results look like for "Forged" Carbon Fiber. It has a cool kinda raw chopped look. Ive seen it gaining popularity in automotive products and Motorsports
The Easy Composites youtube channel has a great video on how to make forged carbon parts using FDM printed molds, it's been on my list of future projects for a long time!
@@bnn9912forged carbon is designed to be made with specyfic amount of fibers to resin calculated for this exact part
Thie part need to be made with way more force aplied on it + fibers need to be perfectly equal in every direction thats why its most of the time super thick for cheap production method
Lambo when making real forged carbon with thin layers need to make spreaded equaly fibers glued together into an "cloth" then use it to make forged or it will fail
It can look easy
Buts its super hard to make it work fine not to thick etc (in case of 3d printer parts its only about thickness etc
Handmade forged is like 99.99% of the time super rough
@@ErtsenPlayGames I agree that the handmade stuff ist really only for aestethic purpososes. Haven't done chopped carbon myself, but figuered the method will only have the mechanical properties of the resin (kind of what cast iron with lamellar graphite has). I have already wondered how lamborghini's process looked like because they use it to make load bearing parts. Thank you for clearing that up.👍
@@bnn9912it works fine for small parts, but anything under load I run continuous fibers in the load direction and it works fine (definitely not optimal), also always thought Lamborghini did not use forged carbon for load bearing applications
I like to put a plastic bag with fine slits or holes cut into it between peel ply and breather.
It's just how I learnt it at my apprenticeship.
17:32 Nice Laura Kampf branded Let Blue Dry^tm block. I have no idea what you built but it looks awesome. I never thought you could make your own vacuum sealed bag so I'm absolutely looking into that
very nice! please post again if you use prepreg to see what the diff would be;
Great Video. Loved the Laura Kampf Köln sentence ❤
Love the "let glue dry" referenz😍
Some tiny holes drilled through the mould from the corners would help the vacuum pull the fibre sheets tight.
Awesome stuff!
Also, confirmed first comment!
@@MadeWithLayers it’s just that cool
Interesting. You already have a 3d model for the toolhead that will fit into the carbon fiber cover you are creating. If you scaled it down just a bit and made it a bit more solid it should be easy to clamp it over the carbon fiber and resin and ensure that the carbon fiber gets into all the corners.
Is this a good idea? I imagine the vacuum pump bag is meant to be dual purpose to get the bubbles out of the resin, however I think if the mould was double sided and had clamping force it would yield a better result?
I've never done this before, just something I would try.
So so good man!
You can make holes in the mold’s corners so that the carbon can get in the corners
Have you tried a 2 part clamped 3d printed mold, instead of the vacuum bag?
Might look at the Ramy RC channel. He has been making large scale RC models of airliners for a few years now evolving a 3D printed mold and mostly hand laid CF process. Also, Mike Patey's channel where he designs and fabricates full scale airplanes using many CF fabrication techniques.
How do you clean the brushes? Water or alcohol? And do you bring the chosen liquid to the recycling station?
I use cheap brushes that get thrown out along with the cured resin. Using solvents to wash the brushes never gave me good results and actually ends up being more expensive overall.
Nice process walkthrough. Makes creating glass/carbon fibre parts using 3d-prints much more approachable.
Regarding the top-coat issue (18:05), I've see on another channel (@DarkAeroInc) where they thinned the topcoat epoxy so it flowed better. The channel is dedicated to working with carbon fibre to build an aircraft. They have used 3d-prints to create molds for some parts, as well as a number of other techniques.
why not just use 4d carbon fiber wrap if it's for aesthetics only? 10x less cost and so much faster. Shame it wasn't a weight reduction mod
You should have a printed part in the shape of the object you’re trying to mold and put that on top to squeeze the fibers when you put it in the mold
Could a food vaccum machine be used? Or are the bags too stiff?
After the pick and peel I pour sand over the bag in a box to pack the resin in corners.
you could've printed the mould with ABS, then removed all the layer lines with acetone, then no need for sanding or coating it in resin
ABS also sands easily, far easier than PLA.
@@Trevellian that is true, but PLA is pretty awful for sanding, pretty much anything is better
easycomposites actually recommends printing the mold in PETG. stronger and easier to release the final part.
Great options, too!
I'm not a composites pro, but I'm thinking you might have better luck using a compression mold instead of a straight vacuum lay up. Easy Composites has a UA-cam channel with an example and TONS of instructional content. Compression molds also allow you to use chopped tow carbon fiber, which some people prefer the look of (forged carbon fiber). Good luck.
It does beg the question, would compressive forces rather than vacuum work better? Not sure if the plastic will take the pressure of a light hydraulic press or not by squeezing the resin between two hard surfaces..
The part looks beautiful and WOW that's a lot of messy work for someone just getting started into this whole process. I'll stick w/ my 3d printers whenever possible. Do you have any idea how much stronger a carbon fiber / epoxy part is compared to a 3d printed part using engineered materials or what the MarkForged can make?
Thomas-
Dry stack the carbon, and vacuum infuse the epoxy. You'll end up with much better fiber/epoxy ratio. A finer weave will also work better around the corners you have in your molds.
Haven't tried that process yet, but other than a catch pot I should already have all the parts needed to give it a try!
It would be interesting to see someone do it like in the auto industry. They heat form the polymer fiber mesh before infusing resin so the fibers stay aligned.
Carbon fiber is amazing, i just cant get over how much waste there is. The bags, the mold.
I think that with this small part for low production will be better and more efficiency if you had print a positive and a negative mold and press between them the fabric (like a sandwich )
i think will be more faster as a procedure and more economic with the same results
maybe worth it next time to try this approach although the vacuum bug method it is the professional way
What kind of LED light do you use and what was the exposure time to cure the resin layer? I am struggling with a smoothing process based on photopolymer resin, and suspect I need a lamp with more power or angle, or just a different light source. The lamp is sadly very out of focus at about 5:03.
A non vacuum method:
Use a 2 side mold. The front like you did.
The BACK side will be covered with a thin layer of clay/silly putty/ soft plastidip spray/ thin foam/ tpu.
Just press them together.
No vacuum is needed.
No bags or special clothe.
Put it in a vice and clean it later with a solvent if you used silly putty.
I really want to see you print the last layers of the back part from TPU. If you do it, let me know how it worked. 😜
It would be so nice if Easy Composites had a sales subsidiary somewhere in Ireland or Netherlands, somewhere in EU. Or is there another way to handle the inconvenience issue using VAT prepayment or something like that?
They do have a warehouse in the Netherlands for EU customers! Though it was still faster for me to order from a German seller, especially when waiting an extra day or two for materials means putting the entire project on hold.
Id bet if you used an external mold instead, the vacuum would do a better job......ie.....printing just the part that it will be fitting on.....and removing the rest of the body of the toolhead so that the entire mold is uniform and then maybe using a vacuum table instead of a bag. But great vids, keep up the awesome work you do!
Would Bondo putty be a suitable alternative to the UV resin? I guess that requires drying and then sanding, too.
Possibly. Or "Glazing Putty". I'd think you'd need to check out any possible chemical reactions and ensure it can withstand the heat produced by the resin.
Anything that creates a smooth and somewhat structural layer should work, as you're creating a barrier between the mold and the resin with the wax + PVA release agents, though some materials seem to be discouraged as they can still mess with the resin curing properly
Another great video thanx. Question why not use a female mold on the other side to form it better can that work?
PrePreg is the way to go.
Forged Carbon Fibre seems more easy to make and you can replace whole part make it lighter not just decoration, also carbon fiber need special coating according to Easy Composites Ltd
Can the parts be pressed using a two part mold?