I am wondering how vacuum infusion would work on a bowl shaped mold. Would the resin pool at the bottom of the bowl? Do you have to put considerable thought into the way resin will flow due to gravity when using this technique on an off-axis part?
Evan, the resin wont pool. infusing a bowl shape id probably go over the top on my first try and use spiral wrap for my resin feed, probably third to half way around the rim, with a vac line opposite, obviously off the carbon on peel ply. How large is the bowl shape. Ive infused some pretty weird shapes with no problems and the bowl shape wont present any greater problem than anything else. The first time infusing anything is expierience and trial and error for resin/vac line placement.
Baz
also, what is the mnimum strength vac pump (cfm) that is required for odd-shapped infusions That are around 2sq ft??
CFM doesn’t matter. It’s the amount of vacuum that a pump can ultimately pull that is important. The closer you can get to full vacuum (~29") the better. CFM determines the rate at which the air is removed, but not the ultimate vacuum pressure. For example, a shop vac moves huge amounts of air (CFM), however, it would do a horrible job at pulling high vacuum. A lot of people the Robinair 15600, Gast, or homemade pumps.
ok…so when picking a vac pump what stats should I be looking at?
How many inches of mercury it can pull. That is the MOST important stat.
If your doing extremely high volume/large parts and multiple parts at the same time… CFM comes into play.
Most affordable hobby pumps that I see on retail websites can pull 25". Spend an extra $100 and it will put you in the 28" range.