Determining the amount of flow media needed

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#1

Hey guys…just thinking about this since Im not brave enough to shave all my flow media down.

I cover the entire part with flow media. But I notice that my infusions take a long time. 12 minutes or better for some stuff and Im using actual infusion resin.

Is it the media? would that make it slower?

Is it that I use 1/4 line on the inlet?

My parts are turning out pretty good…I cant complain too much. But I want perfection.

What determines where you put the media and how much? Im really only interested in the answers out of you other veterans. I want to see what you guys have going on to keep the speed and accuracy up.

Id hate to waste parts experimenting with it. Its cheaper for me to just keep using the media everywhere instead of guessing.

#2

Im sure some will ask, what is the visco. level of your resin mixed. what type of resin are u using, epoxy or ester types? What type of T fitting are u using, any spiral wrap?

#3

How large are the molds too? If a hood size I’d say try using larger hoses.

Also, what vacuum pump are you usine too?

Usually flow media assits the flow of the resin…

#4

post a pic of you part you are infusing. What resin intake system are you using? What kind of flow media are you using. What is the exact resin and also what does you laminate consist of?

#5

two seperate molds…sharing feed line and vacuum line via “T” roughly 24X24 each

ccp infusion resin…

Red flow media and peel ply from airtech

2 layers of tex and 6 layers of plain weave glass

#6

I started having a problem like that because I changed my layup, I had a layer of peelply between the resin feed and the flow media. I figured out what I was doing wrong and layed the resin feed line on the flow media and it went 10x faster.

I use cont. strand mat for flow media the last 3" of the part and on corners. The last part I did was about 25"x27" 1 layer flow media, 1/4" I.D. line and no leak’s infused in 7min. with vinyl ester.

#7

Try moving up to a larger size line. Having a tee on the end will really kill the lines ability to flow. ID on a 1/4" tee is less than 3/16". When I use a 3/8" line with no tee, it is equivalent to a 1/2" line with a tee. Would you rather drink through a jumbo straw or a coffee straw? Place flow media both above and below the inlet line. Don’t be afraid to double up on flow media in areas to enhance flow. I use the airtech red also and ~20"x18" infusions take less than 2 min with a 10%styrene/iso mix.