1972 Imp S4 - March 29th 2011 - Dirty Days

Although I haven't commented on this post, I've read it all the way through. What a thread! Amazing work, talking of Imps', George Bevans' son is a friend of a friend and I'm sure he is refurbing washing machines now! Shame he didn't carry on with the Imp's, god knows what could have been created...

Sept 20th – Stuck fast


Well I polished the mould lots waxed it and laid up some carbon –





I let the resin set and then tried to get the carbon off the mould, it wouldn’t move, at all.

This stumped me for a few days and kinda put me off until today, my friend David Cooper came round and pointed out that I’m missing a few things! First he got the trumpet off the mould, it wasn’t fully stuck, just enough to stop it moving. The surface finish was good enough to pursue the idea, but to make it work I need some gel coat and PVA to make the setup work.

So this weekend I will polish the mould up further lots of coats of wax, then PVA, then some clear gel coat, THEN the carbon. I’ve been missing all these bits out so far, hopefully it’ll work.

Been a bit disheartened but its all back on track now, I’m go up and down like a yo-yo!

Cheers

J

don't worry if it all goes tits up you can start making straw hats for yokels ;D

Seriously James thats looking really good, its all coming together now. You will have it running before much longer I`m sure

Sept 24th – A Trumpeting Success

Well I have been persevering with making my own carbon trumpets, the problem is getting the carbon to release from the mould, not an easy task! After getting trumpets out with poor finishes or not at all I decided to try using PVA as a barrier between the mould and part to be made.

PVA on the surface –



PVA dry –



I laid up a piece of carbon, let the resin go off over night, then proceeded to try and remove it. HO HO HO! It was stuck on better than any of the previous ones



Bastardising basterdiser

What next?

Well after thinking for a bit, I realised that the carbon was only sticking on the neck of the trumpet. Also that the packing tape mould that would release only gave a poor finish around the reverse roll at the top. Perfect solution? Only have the packing tape where it can go on smooth and where the carbon sticks!

So I covered the neck of the mould with tape and left the top roll polished, I have it a good waxing and then proceeded to lay up another trumpet (bear in mind that I was at the end of my tether, if this didn’t work then something else was to be done!).

I let the trumpet go off over night and then tried to get it off, it wasn’t budging oh balls indeed! I thought for a bit and then remembered a piece in PPC that told of whacking the part with a rubber hammer to release the two parts.



Then I pulled the two parts, one in the vice the other in my hands –



BING! Out she popped! Whoop whoop!



This is the piece out of the mould and ready for wet and dry –



The pieces are only one layer thick and so it’s jolly light, about 10g each! Here you can see light through the resin!



I cut off all the spiky edges and made a sanding board to smooth the edges –



All polished up –



Three popped in the back plate just for reference –





I have also started on the plenum chamber buck, this was made up from two bits of four by two wood screwed together, my dad assisted with this as I’m not very familiar with wood! He planed off the edges and then I stated to san it all nice and smooth.





I’m going to crack on again tomorrow with the plenum chamber buck, and ill finish polishing the trumpets, I might even glue them into the back plate!

Cheers

J

gobsmacked

are you making these from sheets of carbon weave or tubes of it?

J - what kind of prices are the sleeves? With some space now available I may have a bosh at this.

p.s. totally awesome thread!

p.p.s is this stuff waterproof/capable of flowing liquid?

I was thinking of doing a petrol filler neck, other bits n bobs. Suppose coolant hoses would be taking the curse word.

You could do a petrol filler neck, but you would have to use a chemical resistant resin, and mabe a sealer of some kind. The sealer can be bought for sealing old petrol tanks and works jolly well apparently!

J