As I mentioned in my last post, the second project of Composites 101 at Nova Labs was a group-build of a wine bottle holder. I didn’t really snap any photos of the build, but go past the jump for the general outline:

• Make/acquire a curved piece of metal to act as the form
• Line the edges of the form with sealant tape
• Mix your resin and apply a coat to the metal form
• Add your first layer of carbon fiber sheet to the form
• Apply additional resin to the top of the carbon fiber wetting it thoroughly
• Add additional layers of carbon fiber and resin (I think we did like 7 or 8 total?)
• Near the end, add a layer of honeycomb (being careful that you didn’t have too much resin on the last layer)
• Apply one last layer of carbon fiber sealing in the honeycomb.
• Lay a piece of release fabric on top of everything
• Lay a smaller square of breather mesh near where the vacuum tube will attach to the top layer of bag film (ours was just a sheet though, and not a tube)
• Cover the piece with bag film, and stick to the sealant tape around the edges
• Cut a small ‘x’ above the breather mesh and attach the vacuum pump nozzle
• Apply suction, and wait for the resin to cure
• Trim and sand the edges after taking everything apart

Of course I’m doing this from memory close to 4 months after I took the class, so proceed with caution!