Prepreg Tackiness

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#1

Hey guys,

So this is the first time I work with prepreg. I got some prepreg carbon fiber from Gurit. (the resin can be found here http://www.gurit.com/se-84lv.aspx)

The thing is this prepreg is really not very tacky, as in touching it bare hand at room temperature barely even feels sticky. Is this normal fro a prepreg? The videos i’ve seen seem to indicate a much higher level of tack. Is it possible the prepreg is no good?

This is proving to be quite problematic since it wont stick very well to the surface of the mould and hence slides around all the time during lay up.

Thanks!

#2

Easy to check if the pre-preg is still good by using a heat gun to heat a piece of fabric up a bit. If the resin goes tacky and a bit liquid then it’s sweet.

If it is all good, which I suspect it will be, then if you need the tack to lay up then you can use this same method. Just run a heat gun over it to warm it up a bit, then lay it into the mould.

#3

Or warm the mould up a bit :wink:
tackyness will decrease when it’s longer out of the freezer. sometimes you can order different levels on tackyness.

#4

What temperature is your shop environment and what temperature is the mould at? SE84 had decent tack when I used it so maybe it is beyond its tack life but still within its out-life.