I have done some thinking and have sided that building with plywood will be more cost effective and yield quicker results. I would love to use a foam technique but the cost of the epoxy would be too costly. Even a honeycomb material would be nice to try and save weight, but that is also more expensive. The local supply of luan (lauan)plywood is horrible with two thin plys on the exterior and one large ply in the middle. The middle ply does not look like a solid ply but some other filler material. However, the birch plywood seems to have even plys throughout the plywood.
Looking at my design, it looks like a slight bend to the panels would add strength and stiffness. Flat panels are easy to join, but are flimsy without any additional stiffing of some sort. After reading more on the stitch and glue technique, it seems feasible. The technique doesn't require any molds or special techniques. It is very reproducible by anyone, as long as the panels are cut correctly. A simple epoxy filler and fiberglass work is needed to cover all the joints for strength.
Showing posts with label fiberglass. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fiberglass. Show all posts
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
Thursday, July 9, 2009
Seat-Fiberglass?
Well, I last spoke about possible methods for making the fairing. I am trying to throw out any ideas that come to mind. Nothing is dumb, some ideas are just better.
Fore instance, far north, might have been Canada, head people for an electric company were trying to find ways to remove ice from the overhead power lines in the middle of the wilderness. Everyone threw out ideas from adding heater to melt the ice, to having bears scratch their back on the poles, which would shake the ice from the wires. They played with the idea of bears scratching their backs on the poles and said what would make a bear itch their backs on power poles. They figured they could hang meat or find something that attracted the bears. Once they thought of how to get the bears to scratch their backs on the poles they tried to figure how do we get the stuff to the poles?
The first thought was to use dog sled, then snow mobiles, then finally someone says we could use helicopters. How would we get the helicopters close enough to the wires to fasten the item to the poles. They discovered the turbulence from flying helicopters over the power lines would shake the ice from the power lines. This was an exercise we used in a management class I took at the local community college and apologize for any inaccuracies.
Now to the point, I think a fiberglass seat could be built similar to this persons: http://buckybikes.blogspot.com/2008/04/seat-building-finished.html
He made a plaster shape of his own back and use that as a mold for the seat. Very cool! I think that building a wooden seat out of thin sheets of plywood and gluing them together could make a decent seat as well, if the shape is right. I think I will post on bent riders to see what a lot of the builders on their forum are doing.
Fore instance, far north, might have been Canada, head people for an electric company were trying to find ways to remove ice from the overhead power lines in the middle of the wilderness. Everyone threw out ideas from adding heater to melt the ice, to having bears scratch their back on the poles, which would shake the ice from the wires. They played with the idea of bears scratching their backs on the poles and said what would make a bear itch their backs on power poles. They figured they could hang meat or find something that attracted the bears. Once they thought of how to get the bears to scratch their backs on the poles they tried to figure how do we get the stuff to the poles?
The first thought was to use dog sled, then snow mobiles, then finally someone says we could use helicopters. How would we get the helicopters close enough to the wires to fasten the item to the poles. They discovered the turbulence from flying helicopters over the power lines would shake the ice from the power lines. This was an exercise we used in a management class I took at the local community college and apologize for any inaccuracies.
Now to the point, I think a fiberglass seat could be built similar to this persons: http://buckybikes.blogspot.com/2008/04/seat-building-finished.html
He made a plaster shape of his own back and use that as a mold for the seat. Very cool! I think that building a wooden seat out of thin sheets of plywood and gluing them together could make a decent seat as well, if the shape is right. I think I will post on bent riders to see what a lot of the builders on their forum are doing.
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