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Old 06-05-2017, 06:26 AM   #1
Kevin Sheets
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Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Bristol RI
Posts: 3,198
Carbon fiber build

Hey guys,
I need some insight and suggestions from gun makers who have done carbon wrap.
I am currently doing my first one. It's a roller gun, 5ft long with a rounded muzzle. I vacuumed bag a Soller carbon sleeve last night and I am wondering how to finish off the muzzle end. I intend on doing another layer on top of this one. Should I use carbon fiber tape to finish off. How well does this stuff blend in to avoid seams, ridges etc. Wet sand and epoxy?
Please respond asap
Thanks
Kevin Sheets
Wksheets@gmail.com
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Old 06-05-2017, 07:07 AM   #2
Diving Gecko
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Join Date: Nov 2014
Posts: 955
Re: Carbon fiber build

Hard to tell you what to do. Composites work is not really easy to help out with remotely;-).
Perhaps if you share some pics of your build that could help people offer specific advice. Especially the shape of your muzzle.

Generally speaking, one of the things sleeve has going for it is that it is quite pliable, so is twill weave cloth. UD and traditional plain weave less so. But it all depends on your shape how to lay down your fiber.

Having a bag helps with trickier shapes but fundamentally, if you can't get your fiber to lay down nicely when you test fit it, a bag probably wont be able to either - you will end up with bridging and/or resin pools.
So, don't be afraid to use relief cuts to the cloth or cutting smaller, better shaped plies which is being done all the time by composite technicians anyways. Tape, btw, is most often just plain weave or UD cloth so not necessarily a magic bullet by any means.
One trick is to get some 3M77 spray glue and slightly mist the surface of the plug (your gun in this case) or the bottom of the cloth and then lay up the fiber. The glue will help the fiber stay in place. If you are only adding a few layers of fiber you should be able to wet them out top to bottom before you bag the gun.

At the end of the day, if your stock is wood, and the band holes quite in-line with the stock then you don't need much, if any, structural strength from the carbon on that area and I wouldn't really sweat it. In all likelihood you are over-building structurally anyways.

If you are talking about ridges when one layer of cloth overlaps another, then a rule of thumb is that the weight of the cloth corresponds pretty much to the thickness like this: 400g cloth is about 0.4mm laminate thickness. Most of Soller's sleeves are about 400-600g, so about 0.4-0.6mm thick app. Or 0.03'' for the thickest. That gap should be possible to even out with multiple top coats with sanding in between.

For bonding a new layer on top of the one you already did, it is easy if you used peel ply on the first one. Besides releasing nicely it is designed to leave a perfectly roughed up surface for secondary bonding without any prep needed. If you took off the peel ply already and handled the gun, degrease it before the next layer. If you didn't use peel ply then degrease, give it a sand with #80-125 grit and then degrease again.

Last edited by Diving Gecko; 06-06-2017 at 08:01 AM.
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