Re: Kevlar, carbon fiber & fiberglass pre-preg

["Tesla list" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>]

Original poster: "by way of Terry Fritz <teslalist-at-qwest-dot-net>" <dhmccauley-at-spacecatlighting-dot-com>


In all seriousness, some old scrap carpet will do the trick just fine.  In
fact, it will most likely cost you absolutely nothing and work great.

Dan




 > If anyone really needs to fabricate custom "scatter shields", etc, one of
 > the easier (but not necessarily the cheapest) ways is to use sheets of
 > material (carbon fiber, Kevlar, Nomex, fiberglass, etc) that are already
 > impregnated with epoxy or other resins (known in the composite industry as
 > "pre-preg"). Just lay up layers of this material up around a mandrel or
 > form, drape a "vacuum bag" around it and pull a vacuum to allow
atmospheric
 > pressure to apply uniform, 360-degree clamping force, shaping the pre-preg
 > to the form. Finally, heat the whole setup in an oven to cure it and
you've
 > got a very strong, complex shape without needing to handle or mix resins,
 > catalysts, etc. The pre-preg can be cut with a scissors or sheet-metal
 > shears, and the finished part can be trimmed using a router with
 > solid-carbide cutters.
 >
 > This is pretty much standard practice for fabricating composite parts for
 > aircraft, race cars, skateboards, boats, snowboards, etc.
 >
 > Do a web search for "composite pre-preg" and you'll get dozens of links to
 > suppliers.
 >
 > Scott Hanson
 >
 >
 >
 >
 >