Unzipped Composites

General Composites Discussions Showcase
#1

Hey guys,

I post fairly regularly on here, but I realised I haven’t posted much of my own work on here. I’ve been lucky enough to be involved with some really cool projects, and even luckier to do it as a living. This may turn into a bit of a photo dump, but I’ll try to restrict it to the stuff I think is most interesting…

Happy to discuss any of my materials, techniques and processes; otherwise just enjoy!

57 Chev:

Alufibre radiator duct (with carbon fibre bow-tie) and inner guards:

Carbon fibre inner guards:

Alufibre dash binnacle:

Pre-preg carbon dash binnacle:

Dash binnacle and glovebox lid:

Right-hand drive conversion full dash:

#2

67 Impala inner guards with integrated airboxes:

Lotus Exige one-piece front clam:

With front splitter and canards:

Pre-preg 4-6" intake pipe, untrimmed straight from the mould:

#3

1968 Brabham bodywork modifications to accommodate extended manifold:

And a custom made little NACA duct for the oil cooler:

Pre-preg combined catch can and radiator overflow unit, with internal chambers and baffling:

Carbon skinned gear surround:

#4

Holy Moly! Some amazing work right there

#5

Nice work Hanaldo!

#6

Really nice wok. All the compound curves look great. I appreciate your pictures.

#7

Really nice work! What materials do you prefer for making molds? Also, I know you like to use Sunshield as an IMC when making parts. Do most of those parts have Sunshield?

#8

Only the Chevvy and Impala inner guards and the Chev dash have Sunshield as an IMC. Everything else is the raw finish.

I use predominantly a Reichold RTS much like Unimould for tooling, ie. vinyl ester tooling gelcoat and skin coat, filled polyester tooling resin. It is hard wearing but still polishes very well, so it is easy to maintain.

That said, with Easy Composites shift to X-Preg, I have started building epoxy tools as well. This I do with Technirez R2501 as a gelcoat, and R2519 for the reinforcement. I’ve been playing around with this a bit lately, using the R2519 to produce my own aluminium/carbon filled tooling putty. Took a bit of messing around to work out how to use it without voids everywhere, but I’ve been getting great results recently, so it’s a nice quick and very cheap way to make epoxy moulds.

All the parts I’ve posted pictures of here are from vinyl ester moulds though.

#9

What shelf life do you get with the vinylester? Nice work.

#10

impressive work. thanks for showing.

#11

Quoted shelf life is a year, but I keep it in the freezer so I’ve never had any go off on me.

#12

Lovely work altogether!

#13

You’re information is like gold man. And your work is awesome! I hope to someday be as good as you.

I’m trying to take the next step into prepreg and want to research the r2501 and r2519. I looked them up but not much of how to use them. Can you maybe pm me or post a step by step?

I really kind of wondering if the 2501 can be sprayed just like a poly tooling gel from a tooling gel cup gun and then use the 2519 resin almost like polyester resin and reinforce with some type of fiberglass or carbon?

But you also mention a putty or slurry mix which confuses me. I have watched the easy composite videos on how to make items but thought I would ask since you posted materials!

#14

I don’t think the Technirez system will work the way you want it to. The R2501 is actually a casting resin for casting vacuum forming tools, much like the system EC sell for that purpose. It’s highly polishable for an epoxy which is why I like it, and it can be brushed on ok, but it is very very thick, I don’t think it would spray well even with a huge nozzle on a cup gun. Given it is a casting resin and seeks its own level, it does also tend to sag. You can deal with this when brushing, but for spraying it would be a battle.

The 2519 though is just an epoxy laminating resin, so you can just lay it up with fibreglass or carbon or whatever reinforcement you want to use. Personally, I hate wet laying woven materials, I always struggle with voids. I’m getting better at it now that I’ve been forced to do it more, but as an alternative I came up with my own recipe for creating a tooling putty using the 2519. This is just a blend of filler powders and fibres, mostly aluminium and chopped/milled carbon fibre, turning the resin into more of a dough. This is really a very quick way of building moulds, so I am going to stick to it for smaller/complex moulds.

#15

Cool man thanks.

I’m going to be working on a new mold and really it’s my first critical one where I need things to not shrink. I’ve been using polyester tooling gel and the polyester low shrinkage “or so they claim” resin I get but wondering what may be better, especially if I want to try some of easy composites ooa prepreg.

#16

amazing work. Post up some more!