Traditional Build with Corecell

On the next boat I build it will mostly pvc, not even the good pvc, just crosslinked. Below the waterline it might be solid glass or corecell.

If you look at my thread you will see I fell in love with infusing inward. On long panels you would just make a cross section resin feed, every so often, proportionate to the length. Then your vacuum points would be in the center of each grid and your resin feed would just run around the perimeter of the part.

It's so easy to set up and you get more control in my opinion but everyone has their favorite style.

Great deal on that pump, congrats.

If your using lumber to frame, you can use plywood. Then you don't have to worry about crowns, dips and twists. You might need to laminate a couple pieces together though I doubt it. I would also paint or seal the wood to keep it from moving as Groper mentioned.

 

I think you are a little under on the $$ budget, but probably close on the hours on the higher number. I'm putting this thing on a customized trailer and that'll end up costing ?20?.

So, do I need to buy the steel in full 32' lengths, or would you just try to avoid overlaps of steel at overlaps of MDF?

It isn't my vision, so trying to be clear. I have to have the 32' stuff hauled in.

I hate to mention it, but the steel would need to stand up off the ground some 30". Were you thinking that'd be steel as well?

If so, I probably wouldn't need to glue the table down to the floor. It'd be too heavy to budge.

 

Im not sure what he meant either but whenever we need to make something very level ... such as delicate machinery etc... we use shims. I wouldn't worry too much about getting perfect flat steel or overlaps. Shim It, then torque it down.

 

Nah you dojt need 32' lengths... just overlap them... the only idea is that the mdf all ends up dead flat on 1 plane and it stays that way for 3 years or more. Yes i would also mount it on steel legs so it end up wasit height. I built mine in steel like this and had no problems - i just didnt make a good surface on top of it...

 

Fallguy,
You can easily make a wood table also ,no need for steel indoors ,you are a wood guy so......Steel is great but isn't wood easier and also accurate & strong?

Also,someone mentioned to use normal epoxy with low viscosity for your infusion test , keep in mind the exothermic reaction of normal epoxy you chose.

 

fallguy; before you start building a full size table would it not be a better idea to do a small vacuum bag and infusion job first.
My first infusions were done on a large glass shower screen from a reclamation yard and a wine bottle for the catch pot.

 

I need a big table no matter what I do for cutting out these sized panels or even hand layup, but thank you for the prudent notion. A large table will never be bad because if I decide to do some handlayups of stuff, I can have multiple jobs going at one time. If I decide I like vacuum work, I can also do more than one bag at a time on a big table.

I think the way it looks right now, I will probably do handlayup on the inside of the panels using a medium or fast set and vac bag or infuse the outside. There is only 4 meters of area inside the boat that shows and 2 meters of that has a bunk, so there is little need to infuse the invisible side. Since I'm a rookie, I wouldn't be able to visually see the resin working on the bottom of the panels. Then for areas that really show; I can use infusion to my benefit to reduce fairing; lower content, and ensure bonding on the water exposed side.

I am leaning right now towards building a table with LVLS. I talked with my welding friend about metal and it is a little bit of a lot of work and I have to hire all the welding. I am able to do many things, but I decided I don't care to learn to weld.

How do you avoid exothermic reaction in a large supply pot for infusion? Hell, I've had small plastic cups get too hot on me. For handwork, I know you can mix and transfer to a flat, shallow cake pan, but not sure what you do for infusion unless you are mixing on the fly somehow?

One of my panels is 32' long and let's just say 3' wide average, and it'll have 400g 45/45 and 400g 0/90 glass on it, or about 16# of resin. With my brother mixing for two minutes; there is no way that'd ever get out of the pot without catching fire.

 

Fallguy ,if you buy proper infusion epoxy ,it is not a factor (heating up/exothermic) ,it's only if using regular epoxy with low viscosity for the test that it could all start smoking toxic fumes and boil over into a hardened clump if you chose the epoxy wrong.
I used some good slow epoxy with very low exothermic reaction ,can pm you brand, but why not use the epoxy for infusion right from the beginning?Andrew recommended one farther up the thread .

 

I plan to do both infusion and handwork for this boat. Lots of inside stuff and no way I am infusing the inside of the livewell, for example. Do I need two epoxies then? Kind of sold on one for its outgassing properties.

 

Jim Caldwell posted :
http://www.carbonfiberglass.com/Resi...Infusion-Epoxy

 

Infusion epoxy is really viscous, it would be more difficult to hand laminate on say a vertical panel so yeah, you need two.

 

the epoxy i was using had 2 different hardeners - 1 for infusion and another for hand layups.

When infusing big jobs - sometimes you need to mix the resin in batches and add it to the bucket your feeding from... no dramas.

Your still missing some of the major points with infusion tho - one of the biggest time and labour savings is the surface you get off the table, the invisible side! This has the perfect finish which doesnt require filling and fairing! And also the fact that you are completing Both sides of the panels at once, your getting twice as much done at once!

I know it must seem like a mystery how the resin flows on the bottom side of the panel. All i can say is just try it and see for yourself. It works and it works very well.

Yes the table will be used for many things - marking out, cutting stuff, hand laminating, wetting out long tapes etc the list is endless - thus make it a good one!

 

good point Groper, thanks

I asked Noah's to check into getting only one side of my corecell scored, but I'd be missing the big advantage by doing so...

So, some of the panels need high density 'inlays' in them. If you don't line up the grooves does that matter for the flow? And would you epoxy those sections to the other areas first, or would you just hot glue and figure the infusion process will fill in the butt joints a/o longitudinal butt joints?

For ordering corecell and or pvc, you wouldn't infuse something like the bunks or bulkheads would you? I mean to say, do I really need to plan ahead what every single piece of core is going to be made from?

 

Check these guys for core, they were much cheaper than Noah
http://www.easternburlap.com/

 

You don't need infusion scores on both sides! Only the perforations are required to get the resin to the table side laminate. Go back and look at the pics I posted of my infused panels, the Shiney side comes off the table side and you can only see the perforations in the foam, no scoring or anything else!

Inlays are easy. You insert them into position before you infuse the panel. You don't need any glue or anything as the resin will find its way into the gaps! I used to use moisture cure polyurethane adhesive between butt joints in the foam sheets so as not to create race track paths for the resin flow. I'd simply staple the foam together whilst that cured and then pull the staples when I was ready to start the layup.

You can use foam come throughout your build if you want to. However you can save money and time by using ply wood in much of the the interior. In fact if I was to build again I'd use ply throughout the interior. Water won't get into the interior except in a catastrophe so I'm not as concerned with using inside and getting rot etc. I don't want plywood out in the exterior tho...

Planning ahead is definitely something you should do. You really should know what your going to do and how your going to do it and what materials are going where. I used to infuse huge panels and then cut them up with a circular saw for the interior furniture pieces I needed. Many of the panels I used were kerf cut and bent into pleasing curved furniture pieces. I measured it all out and work out how I could nest each peice onto a large panel before deciding the exact dimensions of the large panel to be infused. Using long bent panels can be quite efficient at creating desirable shaped furniture. See rob dennys harryproa website for many fine examples of flat panel design and building ideas using lots of bent panel building techniques.

Otherwise just bang together a basic ply interior...

So many ways of skinning a cat