This section is the core of Explore Composites! It’s where the project began – with a few articles about MDF tooling and buying equipment. These aren’t meant to be chapters of a book exactly, or random magazine-like articles – but a bunch of grouped explanations of composite processes, tools and concepts. Ok, like a rambling and poorly organized book! See the table of contents below.
Each section has articles that roughly fit that description. Some articles appear in multiple sections but only where they are relevant.
Progress
I am writing this as I have time. Instead of hoarding it up and spilling it all at once like a book, I figured it would be more fun and less discouraging to “write it in place” and see if people are interested – and so I can learn what things are actually useful. There’s a huge scribbly list pinned up over my desk with several years worth of articles to write and videos to make… so it’ll be a while before EC! is anything like complete!
At the beginning it will be heavy on things I know about and thin on areas where I am clueless. So far it has been a huge push for my own learning – because you never know how well you (don’t) know something until you have to write about it. Lots of things I sorta-knew or assumed are becoming more clear and I’m seeing connections I missed in the past – so I get a lot out of this too. Hopefully I will be able to keep learning with the help of others in the composites industry so this can become a more complete and useful reference.
On Units
EC! uses a mix of imperial and metric. I freely acknowledge that metric is vastly more universal and makes much more sense for a species with ten fingers. I’m a little bit embarrassed about the US still using inches and pounds – but the contrarian in me likes it! Besides, it’s what I learned first and it is more intuitive for me. I have mixed and matched and used both interchangeably. I try to provide both as much as possible. The materials library entries will be one or the other… it’s easy enough to translate. Pre-preg is usually metric because the manufacturers give all the data in metric.
Check out the glossary under the “Resources” menu for an explanation of terms.
Table of Contents:
Safety
- Respirators and Breathing Safely
- Epoxy Sensitization and You
- Health Impacts of Styrene Exposure
- Not Cutting Yourself
Business and Operations
Design for Composites
- Questions to Ask First
- Composite Manufacturing Methods
- Introduction to Types of Tooling
- Introduction to Cored Composite Structures
Tooling
- Introduction to Types of Tooling
- Guide to Mold Release Systems
- Machinable Tooling Boards
- How to Use MDF for Composites Tooling
- Building Big with Tooling Paste
- Adhesive Teflon – It’s Awesome
Lamination
- Introduction to Vacuum Bagging
- Laminating with Pre-pregs
- Slip Joints and Why You Need Them!
- Troubleshootin’ Vacuum Infusion
- Autoclave or Not?
Tools and Equipment
- Measuring Temperature with Thermocouples
- How to Log Vacuum
- Oven Options for Pre-preg Curing
- How to Choose a Vacuum Pump for Composites
- Buying a CNC Router
- Router Cutters for Composites
CNC
- Introduction to CNC Machining Surfaces
- Buying a CNC Router
- Machining Aluminum on a CNC Router
- Fixturing with 5 Minute Epoxy and “Cradles”
3D Printing
- Long-fiber Composites 3D Printing in 2019
- Markforged Mark 2: My Impressions
- Video: My Big 3D Printer Experiment!