Applying Carbon Fiber by Hand

okay so I don't know how this is working
but hopefully it works well um what I'm
going to be doing today is I'm going to
be making seats like this
I've already carved the wood bit and I
I'm going to be putting carbon fiber on
the back here on the bottom side so I
have several of these all carved ready
to go and look these will this one's
something like that um that's gonna be
what the finished product looks like so
at this point I'm putting carbon fiber
on the bottom I will then sand out the
top and fiberglass the top so we get the
black on the bottom and the clear glass
on the top so that's what we're looking
to make so I have the wood bits here
pretty much ready to go
I've sanded this all out a sheet of
carbon fiber here and we are going to
lay that on the seat
all right and I do have I do have my
iPad over here so it's possible I'll be
able to look over every once in a while
and see if there's any questions being
asked feel free to give it a try if I'm
a little slow in answering your
questions I am going to be a little bit
busy over here but feel free and I
appreciate your questions so if we look
at this piece the carbon-fiber ear wraps
all the way around the back comes up the
middle comes up these leg supports and
to the front one thing you may notice in
order to have that happen meeting in the
front these legs and and I want to get
some carbon fiber down on to that
section there so the carbon fiber will
be coming in on either side here I don't
want a blank spot in here so I'm going
to cut some little tab to fit in there
I'm gonna do that by its cut and so
those will fit somewhere in here what
I've done to make this a little bit
easier to work with is I have what I've
done to make this a little bit easier to
work with is I have a couple boxes here
taped to the seat just so I have a
support and it's fairly secure these are
the handles for my Robo metal I've got a
bunch of them in recently so these boxes
are full they're not super heavy but
they've got a little bit of mass to them
so the thing doesn't shift around too
much water all right
no from Dee Dixon so hello thanks for
tuning in so the first thing I'm going
to work on is those little
bits in here so I want to get them
wrapped up around the front end of this
leg and sort of inch or so wide up to
the front of the seat that way when that
layer of carbon fiber wraps around it
will not have a blank spot in there so
we're going to use a piece right out of
this this is the sheet I'm going to cut
the seat out of wrap the seat in and I'm
just going to take some of this and put
a 45 degree angle so the weave of the
cloth is going like this and like this
and so I'm going to cut at a 45 degree
angle and you might I'm not sure how
high-resolution the image is for you but
you might be able to actually see that
where this weave crosses it creates some
diagonal lines so I'm just going to
follow those diagonal lines so I get a
nice 45 with the weed and then I'm going
to cut a piece a couple inches wide so
the reason I cut this at a 45 degree
angle let's quickly show you that so you
see how easily it stretches and distorts
here and it all seems a nice clean edge
there so I can pull on it I can make it
wider you can make it longer so that
that will end up distorting easily
around this complex shape I have to deal
with I'm gonna start cutting off the end
here
and I think this should be enough for
both legs I'm just gonna cut it in half
so the theory here just show you on a
sample piece the theory is I'm going to
lay it down there and then wrap it all
the way around like that so that way the
front edge of the leg covered in that
strip where the two pieces are going to
meet will also be covered and so I'm
going to get that wet out nicely and
hopefully that will blend in to the
final product so to that end I'm going
to put on some gloves I'm probably gonna
take my gloves off at various times and
if you've ever dealt with these gloves
your hands are all sweaty it can be real
difficult to get the gloves off so to
account for that my plane is to actually
put on several pairs of gloves
so this one they're not another pair in
that way as I get one pair of glove all
sticky I can just peel that off and have
a fresh pair of gloves on underneath I'm
wearing this poopy suit just to keep the
epoxy off my clothes and off my skin I
probably should be wearing my organic
vapor respirator at the same time so I
have a full PPE on everything but if I
try and talk while I'm wearing this I'll
sound like Charlie Brown's teacher so
I'm not gonna have that off so so now
I've got three layers of gloves on maybe
I'll go with one more
these gloves are pretty thin so you
don't lose too much dexterity with
multiple pairs on but it does start to
build up eventually bring this in or I
can work on it now I have got some epoxy
here this happens to be the MAS low
viscosity with the slow I have also
taken this and was sitting next to a
light bulb for the past couple hours so
that liquid is actually somewhat warm
and I've also warmed up the shop here to
about 75 Fahrenheit something like 20
degrees Celsius it's pretty cold out so
that's that's a good temperature in here
sometimes I'll warm it up even more
but for now we'll start with that I've
got a mixing container here this is just
a quart deli container so with the epoxy
you want one pump to one pump so I'm not
sure how much I want in here you know I
don't want to make a huge amount all at
once because I'm gonna it's gonna be a
fairly slow process to get this all wet
out and I don't want this gearing on me
too much so they start with small
batches and so I pump up the resin and
one on the harbor and I always know that
they gonna be starting resin and
finishing on the hardener so instead of
going one two three four five one two
three and then the phone rings I'm just
going to continue to do one pump and one
pump do make sure the pump rise all the
way to the top
these are just ketchup or mustard pumps
they're not like high-tech scientific
instruments these pumps they'd happen to
work quite well but you need to baby
them a little bit run it all the way
down to the bottom each all right that's
probably gonna be enough for now you
know I've got an inch or so on the
bottom now I won't think about a shop
where we build strip build boats we
never lack for stirring sticks so we
want to thoroughly stir this and usually
they say stir for about a minute some
people say two minutes the thing to be
sure you do is make sure it's thoroughly
mixed and so a lot of these plastic cups
have sort of ridges in the bottom that
can be hard to you know sort of
reservoirs of unmixed resin so you want
to make sure you dig down into those
scrape down the sides a lot and keep
stirring vigorously for a fair amount of
time here
[Music]
right so just getting this well and
thoroughly mixed again scrape down the
side several times as you go and I tend
to like to hold the cup at a bit of an
angle so it's constantly running down
into that bottom corner and that way if
I mix down into that bottom corner
I sort of know that's a place where all
the resins gonna end up there eventually
so I'll hold it a bit of an angle okay I
also like to have a fairly deep
container just you know especially when
I'm working on a boat I'm wandering
around carrying this container of epoxy
and you know if you use a small
container that's almost full any little
angle you tip it you end up drooling the
epoxy all over the floor so a deep one
just controls that urge to drip all over
the place so brush is a simple chip
brush this is an inch and a half thirty
eight millimeter something like that
I like these brushes they're cheap
they're disposable and the bristles are
primarily white width and what that
means and it doesn't matter too much in
this application but if you're doing
fiberglass those white bristles
essentially turn clear in the epoxy so
if you end up losing a bristle in the
epoxy you're probably not going to see
it so chip brushes work well so get the
brush wet out and I'm going to apply
some resin to this area where I'm going
to be putting low pieces of cloth so
sort of pre wet out
so there's something for the fabric to
stick to you saw me blow at this little
these threads of carbon fiber they're
very tenacious they want to stay and
it's not really a big deal to disappear
but just trying to keep it a little bit
me I'm going to take this piece and lay
it up on the foot and out to the end of
the seat there and get it well saturated
so I had written here before I've had a
place to stick and this this carbon fuck
really sucks up a fair amount of resin
if you're used to working with
fiberglass you know four ounce
fiberglass or something
the carbon fiber sucks up a lot more
resin and fiberglass does and it could
be a little hard to deal with sometimes
because you think you should have it all
wet out there should be plenty of resin
in there but it just sucks up so much
too you need to be prepared for that all
right
likewise on this side
so I have three of these seats to do
today
so actually two of them going to use
this carbon fiber on the third I have a
heart hybrid carbon Kevlar will
hopefully be getting to three different
seats today all right so now I've got
that little tab located in there now I
want to get some epoxy over the whole
thing because I'm gonna lay glass over
the whole thing or carbon fiber and it
will just help to have a little bit of
something to adhere to as I'm laying
that down I'm not putting it on too
thick but this way I don't need to count
them wedding out the you know saturating
the wood through the cloth I know that
there's at least the starter layer of
resin over the whole
I'm trying to move fairly fast here
because the resin just keeps on getting
thicker and thicker the longer you let
it sit so the quicker I get it out of
the cup on to the piece I'm working on
the better it's going to perform the
easy old beat for saturating the fabric
and saturating the wood all right let's
see what happens here
so I think I'm going to try and pick up
the carbon fiber and again this carbon
fiber wants to stick to everything and
so instead of peeling off the glove just
yet I'm gonna wipe my hands down with
the rag try and get them somewhat clean
and now I have this piece of carbon
fiber lay it down like this
all right so I don't know that it shows
up on the video but there is this
diagonal line running through the due to
the twill weave meeting together and I'm
trying to line that with the center line
and so it's running straight four and a
half Thanh the seat doesn't matter that
much on the seat like this which was
hard to see but so I'm gonna just try
and start to get this to conform to the
shape of the seat and again since I did
this at a diagonal so the weaves going
this way and this way and I have these
linear lines from the feet going this
way that means that the fabric is
running the cross like this and across
like this so it's not hitting that
corner and having to wrap straight up it
can hit that at a diagonal that eases
that corner a little bit makes a little
bit easier for that to make it around
the corner and I've cut that resin on
there to give it a little bit of initial
stickiness
all right so that's starting to get in
place there now I've got excess here on
those legs I don't need it to run across
the bottom of the legs come straight
down here in the back of the leg and now
wrap that in there like wire inside all
the way to the end of that maybe
slightly beyond all right now let's get
rid of some of the excess around the
edge here
and this here will trim so even with the
front alright that looks like it's
conforming fairly well now we start
wetting that out and I'm gonna start
here the hardest part is this turn from
the bottom up the side of the leg I'm
just gonna ease it down into that corner
likewise on the other side so I'm eating
it down into the corner there
so when I made this see I made sure
there was a pretty good transition
radius between the bottom and the side
of that leg that way make it as easy as
possible for the fabric to make that
transition so now I'm going to just get
a good amount of resin onto that carbon
fiber stuck down brushing it so much I'm
dabbing it down I want the fabric to
conform to the shape and again is that
it that sort of bias diagonal which
makes it easy to distort so if I pull on
this too much it runs the risk of
pulling that we out of place so I'm just
dabbing it down but I'm really using the
ability of this fabric to distort and
wrap around complex shapes and the
carbon fiber is really very good at it
it's amazing the contours with the
carbon fiber will wrap around and if
you're used to working with the glass
the obvious thing you notice here is
with fiberglass starts out white goes
nice and clear the carbon fiber here
stops out black and gets even blacker so
it's hard to know whether it got enough
resin on it I don't know if I can get it
up here so you can see but over on this
side it's got a certain gloss to it and
over on that side you see it's sort of
blacker and you see the dry stuff at the
bottom edge there so you see I don't
have that train I get a little bit wet
out up at the top you really need to pay
attention to how the color of the cloth
changes to see if it's fully wet out
when it's a little bit dry like right at
the butt cheeks there it's a little bit
of a dry spot it's a little
to see and a naturist coming through on
the video just gonna take a little bit
more resin so let's get this use what
I've got here
so one thing about this layup doing a
hand layup like this you know people
think of carbon fibers being lightweight
this is not a particularly lightweight
layout because I'm doing hand layup and
I'm putting on probably more pots either
going to needs I'm really using the
carbon fiber here because it looks cool
I think it's a kind of cool look with
this having the black underside so it
just makes a nice contrast between the
bright wood on the top and the black on
the side so I've pretty much got that
all saturated this is always a tough
place right back here sort of at the
heel of that foot there's a lot going on
right there and you do want to make sure
you're wet all the way up to the top
edge of that foot and a little bit
beyond and at the front edge here I'm
wrapping this layer around the corner a
bit so that first piece I put in is well
covered and I can sand into little into
the second piece a little bit and
feather it in so you don't see that
transition very well I can blend that in
pretty nicely
it is the underside of the seat so if
it's not perfect it's gonna be hard for
anybody to see but you want a nice job
just in case somebody pulls it out so
now I need a squeegee
small squeegee here and a little paper
Dixie cup I'm gonna tape and cut a
little slit at the top of the Dixie cup
just like that I tend to cut it right on
where the paper is doubles doubled up
for the seam on that so it's just a
little bit stronger plastic cups don't
work very well for this they last
longest so I'm going to now just lightly
take the excess off run it through my
slot there
something Rory's asking must be
underneath be done with carbon what a
fiberglass no absolutely the carbon
fiber is just for appearances
fiberglass would work just fine in this
application the carbon fiber just looks
cool so you do not need to use carbon
fiber on your seats unless you want to
and I just think it looks cool
so I'm taking the excess here just
lightly scraping the surface and bong it
through that slot in the cup and that
leaves the squeegee nice and clean and a
little bit of resin gets in the cup
every time
I'm not putting a whole lot of pressure
on this I'm just trying to get the bulk
of the excess off get to the cloth press
down tight against the wood as much as
possible oh if you're using glass you
could you make it a lot more pieces if
this you know I'm trying to do it in
this minimal number of pieces here
because I want the weave of the fabric
to have a nice continuous look to it but
you know if you're using fiberglass
that's clear you know you're not going
to see the weave so you can patch it
together and feather the edges in
together but the the carbon fiber does
look cool
all right so that's one just about ready
over there and I'm just going the back
edge of these again in this area it
really wants to pull off of that so I'm
just going to use my fingers there even
some wood showing up just make sure it's
well pushed down into those Phillips all
the way around I'm just going to take
this one
so I have another one here be much the
same deal this is one that I cut on my
scene see machine actually all of these
I cut it several years ago but this one
is super thin I actually cracked it over
here just trying to trim it off the
other day I don't know that this will
actually survive in the long run but I
figured I'll put some epoxy on it and
carbon fiber and just see what happens
it's some not something I'll give to a
customer but maybe I'll put it in one of
my own boats it'll be super lightweight
because it's so thin it's it's less than
a millimeter thick was cracked right in
here and basically there's it's probably
half a millimeter or less thick so it's
not really strong but we'll see I think
with the carbon fiber glass over the
result will be plenty tough
right now I need another of those little
pieces right there so I'll cut it out of
this
so again I'm cutting the triangle pieces
off in and then I will just cut that in
half so those are ready to go now this
will mix up a little bit more box
so again I just choose a system for
yourself I want to go with the resin
first in a hardener second just to be
consistent and so I'm putting it in this
presentation so it's a little bit more
lively cold when I go to reach with it
reach it with my hand so that first
batch I made was just about the right
amount to do the whole seat
and again I'm just double-checking that
the pumps risen all the way back to the
top here and finishing on the hardener
so that's about the same amount as they
made last time is about the inch the
quarters of an inch in the bottom of
that so any questions over here lucky
dogs talking about the two by two twill
weave being good at conforming and I
think I think that's true
so this twill weave goes to over to
under to over two hundred and so then
the next year next yarn over does the
same but starts one yarn different so it
ends up with a diagonal line and that
twelve weave makes it does make it
really conform easily but I must say
that even a plain weave over-under
over-under seems to work pretty well
maybe not as well as the twelve but this
will just seems compared to fiberglass
just seems to conform better yeah
asking the weight on this cloth this is
a six ounce cloth and your regular twill
wheat or regular plain weed so this is a
plain weave cloth and this is a twill
weave cloth he's I don't know if that
difference shows up well but you can see
the distinct diagonal lines going
through the twill there is a diagonal
going through the plain weave also but
that over under over that two over two
under seems to make a difference if not
as much holding it down and technically
I believe the twill is a little bit
stronger given the same weight because
there's fewer crimps each time you've
been
the fabric it weakens the fabric a
little bit and so at will since it's
half as many crimps it's a little bit
stronger but you know as far as weight
goes there are lighter weight fiber
lighter weight carbon fiber fabrics
available but they tend to get really
pricey these nominal six ounce claws are
fairly available they're pricey but not
nearly as pristine as some of the finer
weight cloth in carbon fiber in twill
and plain weave are fairly standard to
find and you're now able to find some
really cool weaves where they're making
really interesting patterns in them and
I should get some of that at some point
because we look cool you know they're
they're designed to be decorative so
again let's stir on that and now I will
once again let out the front edge of
these feet
and get this piece laid in there like so
and again this this shape that you're
able to lay that cloth in if you're
trying to do this not cutting on a bias
there's just no way you'd ever make it
make it wrap around it shaped like that
excusing so again get this little
saturated down there
[Music]
so now I will pre coat the whole thing
and I'm laying it on pretty heavy here
you hold it they be handed with
because I want to have enough resin on
there to fully saturate the carbon fiber
because it takes take so much to suck up
into the fabric if so you know as far as
to the finished weight of this carbon
fiber versus of fiberglass if I were
using a six ounce 5s cloth versus a six
ounce carbon fiber cloth you know the
cloth is a per square yard weight
measurement and so which is heavier the
carbon fiber the blasts well they're
both exactly the same weight or
nominally the same weight so with the
carbon fiber since it's a less dense
cloth it actually sucks up a lot more
resin per square yard so as a
consequence a square yard of carbon
fiber in a hand layup versus a square
yard of fiberglass in a hand layup the
carbon fiber is going to be heavier it
should be stronger in you know the
carbon fiber strong stuff that's why you
can make lightweight things with it
don't expect to actually be saving
weight doing any kind of hand layup like
this you're really doing it because it
looks cool and I think it does look cool
alright so I'm gonna get this ready for
the layer of fabric just down over the
top of it and again I'm gonna try and
get that diagonal actually diagonal runs
both directions but it's more visible in
one direction than the other direction
so one side again I'm trying to get this
diagonal line lining up with the center
line just for visual appeal
all right so we have it loosely stuck
down here
trimming off the excess does make it
easier to wrap the fabric law around you
have less yarns you know these yarns out
here do affect how easily the fabric
wraps so by trimming them off you no
longer have to worry about how they're
interfering with your layout so again I
get that tucked in either side and then
I'm going to just run down
you're trying to record this on my other
camera because this will hopefully come
out as a standalone video on the process
and this morning I recorded the standing
process and I'll get the glass thing of
the topside eventually and then combine
that all into one longer video alright
so now we're just gonna get this dad
down the way so again you start by
getting it down into that fill up there
both sides
alright question from Monty Edwards
about how long I have with the epoxy I I
warmed this epoxy up before mixing it so
I had a light bulb around the jugs to
make it fairly warm it didn't get super
warm but you know they're warmed up over
the ambient temperature of the room a
bit that lowers the viscosity but also
speeds up the cure time and I warmed up
the shop here so I said earlier on the
shops probably in the I I got it up to
70 to 75 something like that
just to be a little bit warmer and just
before I started on this I turned the
heat off in the shop so from now on it
should be cooling overnight but the warm
shop speeds up the cure and the warm
epoxy speeds up the cure and if I had
this in a big jug with a lot mixed up
here the very fact that I had a lot
mixed up would speed up the cure the
epoxy is a exothermic reaction so as the
chemicals cure they give off some heat
and so the more epoxy you have the
faster it cures but once you get it
spread in film on the surface of your
boat or in this case a seat that slows
right down way down you know it's almost
immediately down to ambient room
temperature here once it's spread out on
this
but that is I gave it a little bit of a
boost as far as its ability to saturate
the fabric by warming it up so I have
probably 10 20 minutes after mixing this
up in this situation before I really
need to panic on it so I'm not you know
that's giving me plenty of time to get
this process done and I'm just mixing
the next batch in that same pot so even
though there's some you know partially
or partially cured epoxy in there
already basically you add new stuff but
it doesn't cure that much faster just
because you're already got Nick's stuff
in there I'm sure it makes does miss
Nick's faster but not enough to really
worry about so I think I've got this all
wet looking for dry spots all the way to
the edge so get my squeegee again
the cool recommending not to having
carbon fiber on the top side of the seat
so I'd a you don't burn your butt
probably good thought yeah you know I
like the look of the wood and the
finished seat but I also think the wood
actually looks better when is contrasted
with carbon fiber that that contrast
between the two sets the them both off
and a better light so I'm just trying to
get off the bulk of the excess here get
rid of them any major drips this will
all get a fill coat either tonight or
early tomorrow ideally I get this while
I was still tacky with a Philco but
we'll see how ambitious I am tonight my
feet using up all my energy trying to
make this live stream thing work alright
so there was a discussion on the
Facebook kayak building page one of the
kayak building pages in past few days
talking about when to apply fill coats
ideally the best time to apply a fill Co
is while the after the epoxy has cured
up sufficiently that is bonding the
fabric tightly down to the wood but
tacky enough that there's still good
chemical bonds hanging out there waiting
to make a good cure with the next coat
so that's sort of in a sticky state and
when that is really depends on the
temperature top
epoxy you're using etc so it's hard to
say the best way to tell let's just go
out and touch it
feel what it feels like and the
recommended test I heard from the folks
at mas epoxy is to use a cotton ball and
just dab the cotton ball onto the
surface if it's really wet like it is
now the cotton ball will just pull right
off and not pull any hairs off of it
because so wet that it's not really
stinky yet if I let it dry completely
you touch it with a cotton ball cotton
ball won't stick it off because it's
hard you want to find that place where
when you touch the cotton ball or q-tip
to the surface it sticks and pulls hairs
off the ball and that's a sign that you
know it was sticky and it's a good time
to apply a new coat you'll have chemical
bonds sitting out there waiting to do
their thing where if you wait too long
those chemical bonds are sort of used up
not available for new stuff to stick to
so last one here those two were mahogany
this is Western redcedar with a couple
accents of Alaskan yellow sea
and I'm going to be using this
carbon Kevlar hybrid claw actually
because these multiple pairs of gloves I
bought the fresh pair of gloves on
sticking so on the carbon fiber I use my
regular scissors I use four fiberglass
these will cut fiberglass and carbon
fiber no problem but trying to cut the
carbon it doesn't do anything catwalk so
I have this very scissors particularly
for a Kevlar and I'm not exactly sure
how they're sharpened differently they
have a little bit of a texture to it so
it keeps the yarns or fibers from
sliding along it grabs them a little bit
and I think the angles a little bit
different so again I'm gonna cut a
diagonal out of here and you see these
scissors no problem and I'm gonna get it
again the two inch wide piece here
this is one don't cut the other out of
this edge so I will once again mix up a
little bit more epoxy
so this likewise is a six ounce fabric
I'll show you a close-up in a moment but
it's still a twill so it's still two up
two down offsetting by one each time and
in this case it's alternating yarns of
Kevlar and carbon fiber so there's the
warp and weft of the seam or nominally
the same and it makes a nice little
twill pattern there a nice little sort
of houndstooth pattern but I think looks
cool and again you know it's probably
overkill for our purposes to be using
the exotic cloths like this but
[Music]
basically I will just use a utility
knife you know little box cutter knife
and trim the edge and then I'll sand it
and that will make a nice sharp edge
there well with the Kevlar it can end up
fuzzing up a little bit but I found that
if that fuzz up happens you can just
keep all the finer and finer sand papers
and eventually the fuzz gets sanded down
to nothing so I I'm just letting
everything hang at this point and then
they'll come back and they'll sort of be
a thick layer of epoxy there and ideally
I'll get this
well that epoxy is still green and
leathery
and so it'll cut easily with that
utility knife and you know even the
Kevlar what you think is really hard to
cut in the carbon fiber you think oh
that's really strong and leathery epoxy
with the sharp utility knife you cut
through it no problem cuts very easily
alright so we've got this mixed up so
this is what the cloth looks like so you
can see running vertically every other
yarn is yellow and black and running
horizontally every other yarn is yellow
and black so the yellow is the Kevlar
the black is the carbon fiber and it
makes a cool pattern I'd like to look at
it and you see you'll get these lines
where black and yellow line zigzag lines
where the two yarns are the st. kind on
the surface together and so I'm going to
try and line those up so we have my
brush once more we're going to brush
some epoxy onto this
all right so that's a pre saturation I'm
going to try and run these that black
and yellow diagonal straight
fore-and-aft
this stuff also conforms quite nicely
and we'll get this fully saturated
having the resin below soaked up from
below does help the wet out process on
this
but you can see so the the contortions
the yarns have to go through they're
coming along diagonally then they wrap
up that curve and wrap around the side
again if we were running the yarn
straight up this way and straight across
that way
it just it would not have a fun time
doing it so once again I will pre
saturate the wood here
so if this the process for these three
is pretty much the same this one's only
different in that I'm using the carbon
Kevlar cloth instead of the pure carbon
the those diagonal lines I've talked
about in the carbon fiber are more
evident in here because of the
alternating carbon and Kevlar yarns
solely a little bit more careful and
getting those lined up nicely alright
here I have a little bit of lot of
carbon fiber to see if the end grain of
this cedar really sucks up the resin so
it doesn't hurt to overfill that a bit
all right once again we will take this
fabric and those diagonal lines are
running vertically so I'm going to try
and get this down so they're running
straight down the center
that's getting it tucked in around of
that leg the camel art is definitely
harder to cut custard a carbon yard
yarns without a second thought
struggle a little bit - those can get
more yarns and I think the fact that
there are diagonal the scissors here is
probably axe making a little bit harder
too
so I want these my expensive Kevlar
scissors I want to keep them free so I
fixed them do you need alcohol there and
that I should probably always do that to
my scissors if you look at these
scissors you know they're really gummed
up with epoxy I bring these two classes
and students use them and I just let the
epoxy build up but I will use a paint
scraper to get the built up epoxy that's
why I get stuff off there but a little
denatured alcohol water it is still wet
works
so now we will once again get this
completely wetted out this is a little
bit easier than the carbon fiber to see
that a saturated color change and the
Kevlar is a little bit more pronounced
it goes from a sort of bright yellow to
a greenish so that does make it a little
bit easier to see
I'm finding I have a little space here
where the in front edge of the seat is
not completely covered with fabric so
I'm going to just see if I can pull the
fabric down a length a little bit and
get it so stretches
here's the black yarn we don't want that
in the surface it'll be more visible
than on the carbon on carbon
yeah Thomas Cooper talking about the how
you doing tom
like the woods showing through the the
carbon fiber yeah it can you know I I
tend to not worry about it too much
the more you distort the cloth here the
more likely it is that those weaves just
open up in such a way that you can see
the wood showing through one way to deal
with that so the best way is just paint
the wood black or tint the wood black
before applying the carbon fiber that
way you may be seeing the wood but you
won't know it because it'll be black so
we're just getting this nicely out there
nice happy carbon fiber
happy Kevlar
and there's a little bit distortion
that's visible here and the weave around
this back foot I can sort of pull on it
a little bit to support even that out
and distribute the distortion a little
bit more evenly throughout the wrap make
sure you get up the sides of the legs
it's easy to miss that
okay Rory
I've had problems keeping the carbon
fiber down and the angles it seems to
straighten out and lift away from the
wood yeah again try and make it so the
bias lays into those corners so instead
of having the yarns come straight up
this way and run straight parallel to
that corner I've set up the yarns in the
bias so it's easing that corner and
making it a less drastic corner and that
definitely helps I have found you know
people often talk about working in
falling temperatures while doing
fiberglass work on stripper poles I
found that it's even more critical when
using these fabrics the fabrics are not
good at letting the air escape out
through fabric and so you can end up in
a situation where you can't see the
bubble because it's under the cloth but
there's a bubble there and it can't get
out through the fabric in the same way
it might in fiberglass so if you have
outgassing from the wood due to the wood
getting warm and warm or throughout your
process you'll end up with really bad
bubbles and it's really hard to see them
until it's kind of too late I have found
however and this is from experience that
even when the epoxy is hard as long as
it's only recently hard you can take a
heat gun and soften the epoxy up and
press out a bubble you know it's not
recommended that you allow it to happen
but it you know comes to shove and he
end up in the situation where you've got
some major bubbles try and inspect with
your work fairly early on in the cure
process you know babysit it and if you
see bubbles rising up a start to make
sure your temperatures drop and to just
make those bubbles shrink and be you can
come and heat them up with the heat gun
and press them back down if you get to
them early enough
so this is just about ready
and I feel this grunge cup starting to
warm up at the bottom of the earliest
grunge is starting to kick off again
it's um a fairly thick blob here and
this will make a nice muffin probably is
that epoxy kicks off the air trapped in
the epoxy from all the scraping I've
done will start to expand and don't end
up looking like a souffle here I call
that bacon muffins all right so
I also find with the epoxy cup typically
if you just leave the epoxy brush over
the top let it keep or you can probably
pop the old epoxy out of there or just
use it as is with the layer of cured
epoxy in the bottom it doesn't matter
but if you leave the cup down there's a
brush down in the cup then it's harder
to just straight away use it and it's I
find it harder to get the brush the
whole bit of epoxy out of there with the
brush stuck into it it seems to be
easier if there's nothing in there and
then I just squeeze the cup and crack it
out of there and generally have good
results with that all right so just
double-checking around these feet making
sure it's living in there wrapping
nicely edge looks pretty good
so let's see if there's you have
questions here
how long do you have to great
explanation hand lay-up
somebody's wondering where the Russian
subtitles are sorry about that next time
anything else okay I think that's what
it shows you the process I'm gonna let
these cure up and probably get a fill
code on it again either tonight or
tomorrow morning and see how it all
comes out so feel free after I'm done
here to keep on asking questions on in
the comments and we can try to get to
them and you know I'll answer them the
old-fashioned way all right Kevin
deboning I'll be putting carbon fiber on
small wooden pieces vacuum bagging a
good idea vacuum bagging is going to
provide a stronger light lighter layup
with carbon fiber but it's it's a bit of
a hassle the alternatives so the cheap
man's vacuum bagging is to use a peel
ply so a peel ply is a nylon fabric
sometimes treated with something so it
the epoxy does not bond to it but the
epoxy doesn't bind to nylon very well
anyways so if you're dealing with flat
surfaces you lay that excuse me you lay
the fabric down so your carbon fiber wet
it out completely and then over saturate
it a little bit and then you lay down
your peel ply and squeegee it down tight
and you'll get a resin soaking up
through the peel ply and you can even
squeegee off the excess and when when
it's cured you go ahead and you peel
that peel ply right off and it leaves a
nice surface that's basically glue up
ready sanding ready you don't need a
fill coat
and it's a really inexpensive easy way
to get some of the properties of a good
vacuum bag the reason I am not doing it
on these seats is it does not do well in
complicated shapes so the peel ply
doesn't conform the same way that I
would last or carbon fiber conforms to
these complicated shapes so I couldn't
lay it down and have it do all these
curves it just doesn't like to do curves
the peel ply does flat surface really so
actually this this is my backrest I
don't know if you can see but that's
carbon fiber and this I laid a peel ply
on essentially it's it's not a compound
curve the peel ply lay down on it very
easily and end up with a nice surface
and just a light sanding on that and I
can glue it directly to it it's a nice
it's a really nice thing I wish that we
were easier to use on the layout of the
layout of a full boat if you could light
peel ply down on it and have good
results you'd save weight because you
essentially don't need a Philco and
you're compressing the fabric and
squeezing the excess resin out and it's
a nice thing but the complex shapes will
be even in fairly simple canoe I think
there's things you could do you could
cut strips and lay it down and you know
so each strip doesn't have to conform to
quite as complicated
but each time you have an overlap of the
strip you'll end up with the rich name
that would you would have to sand down
so I think that it would just not be
worthwhile but it's something I keep
thinking about and you know if anybody
wants to do the science on that report
back I'd like to hear how it goes all
right I think I'm going to call that the
day here again if you have any questions
feel free to post them in the comments
and I'll try to get back onto those
shortly let's see how do we stop this
thing there we go there's an X stop yes