How To Speed Up My Project? Ideas?

They are eagerly anticipated.

 

Infusion is not difficult but it will not be quicker.
It will give you a lighter boat, better quality laminate and eliminate long back braking hand laminating jobs.

 

I'm not so sure about your quickness evaluation, Andrew.

See, if I hand laminate 3 strips (full roll width) from bow to stern, this takes about 6 days and results in an uneven surface I then have to fill with bog and smooth (sand) out. The surface is still always a little bit poor and shows a weave, so there really would be two bogging sessions before the final fairing to get things going. The total time involved in this is weeks.

Now, if I infuse, I am left with a smooth surface that needs only final fairing. It takes a day or two to place the fiberglass and infusion layers, bagging the whole lot. Next, it takes a day to pump down and look for leaks. Finally, it takes a couple hours to infuse the whole hull, then go do some office work and check on it for 24 hours while it kicks.

So... instead of weeks to get to the point of a smooth hull surface, it can take days.

Much much faster than the hand lamination. The killer is that by yourself, you can't do the full width laminations back to back and must take one day off in the middle of them to both rest and to sand the bow-to-stern 2" overlap between strips. That sanding of the overlap area is also eliminated with infusion.

It's tremendously faster than hand layup for large pieces like hulls.

Also, the quality of the final part is a big driver as well. I agree with you on the lightness and quality of the finished product. Ordering supplies now for this.

 

I allowed 5 days to hand laminate the hull, 2 days for the outboard side, 1 day for inboard side and 1 day for the deck.
5 days versus your 6.
Infusion I say six days, still breaking up the job into 3 sections. One day to assemble each section and half day to infuse.

Providing you have no leaks or out-gassing of the resin the infused laminate will be much better. But this is only in the micro void and fiber wet out level.

If you use peel ply for hand laminating there is no weave to fill in. I assume the uneven surface you refer to is the cloth overlaps, these will be the same in both cases, OK marginally less (<0.5mm) for the infused because of the consolidation.

 

Furthering the discussion... in red...

 

In my case breaking the job into 3 sections time taken was 15 - 30 minutes, watching the resin go in is the quick and fun part.

2 hours is for the infusion, did you ask how long did it take to assemble the job.
To get this straight are you saying the bare foam hull was dry assembled inside and out without damage whilst retaining its true shape?

Yes triaxial can be a pain and some are lot worse than others, aren't you using 2x750g as the outer laminate. The 750g will be easier to wet out and work the bubbles out, I use 750g and get a good finish.

 

The assembly of the job took quite some time, but it's so much easier to do. I do it every time I do a hand layup anyway. I lay out the whole stretch of glass and trim to fit, then roll back up and hand laminate.

Yes, they dry assembled the entire bare hull on foam, inside and out, whilst retaining its shape. They did not have the same mold we do. They had a male mold, so gravity held the foam in shape better than ours. It didn't suffer from as much springback. Then again, that my be because they used the proper foam thickness. My 25mm foam is very bad with springback. So yes, they positioned everything in place and infused the whole lot in one go.

Ah... yes.... I have 1150 for inside and out, instead of two layers of 750 outside. This is the issue, I suppose.

 

Hi catbuilder,

If you can get the infusion to go well then thats great, however the risk VS reward seems completely unjustified to me for just a second hull... i also fail to see how it will save you any time... reading your posts, it seems that your hand lamination methods most likely could be improved and save time that way...

Why dont you use peel ply when hand laminating? Saves you sanding between layers on the seams and makes the bogging job go smoother... once the resin has hardened, just peel off the edge strip where your next roll will join and laminate again, the peel ply takes away the amine blush and leaves a good secondary bonding surface. Roll it up and wet it out with the glass togeather in the same stack... leave the rest of the peel ply on the job until your ready to bog everything as it protects it and keeps it clean and any subsequently spllied resin all gets peeled off with it etc. You can use the peel ply to hold down the glass tight by temporary stapling the laminate down in areas where the glass doesnt lay flat like wrapping around corners/edges. When youve done the whole hull, then peel it all off and start your bogging making sure its not too runny... you havnt sanded anything at this point... using peel ply leaves a finish no different to if you had infused it, just the laminate wont be as tightly compressed... so i dont see what time you would save infusing, and you risk big dramas, extra cost, and setup time if it goes wrong - which is very likely for a first time (speaking from experience).... If you have the energy (i dont know how quickly you can work) you can start your next roll of glass down the hull whilst the first is still green (gelled but not cured) the secondary bonding isnt an issue whilst the resin is still green. And same again for the third roll onto the second etc etc....

What sort of tools are you using? Do you have an industrial window cleaners type sqeedgy on a painters pole? Makes pushing the resin around and working large areas quick and easy, sraping off spilled resin and runs from the core etc...

Do you wet out the glass on a large peice of visqueen plastic on the floor or melamine table, then roll up the wet glass (and peel ply)and transfer the wetout glass to the hull or do you wet it out as you go on the hull? Using the plastic on the floor or large melamine table, you can mix up large quantities of resin and spread it out quickly before it has a chance to heat up too much... so you just keep working green on green until its all done or your day is at an end... in which case you can continue where you left the previous day by peeling off part of the peel ply...

If it were me (im young and work fast) id prepare everything ahead of time then enlist the help of a few friends and hand laminate the whole damn hull in one day... Someone mixing resin and a couple others helping rolling it all up and out and working the laminate etc...

 

You should have gone with the Kelsall method - laying out develop-able panels on smooth benches.

The finishing ( as Maini has said a few times ) is a &&^*&%* job !