Zenith Aircraft Builders and Flyers
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Wing strut fairings
I am experimenting with fairings for my wing strut attach points.
My method is to design the fairing in solidworks, and then print male and female mold with a small offset. The offset is designed to be enough for gelcoat for the mold, and the layup of gelcoat and chop strand matt plus resin. I made the prints about the maximum size I could do on my 3-d printer (quidi x-plus). They will take a little sanding to smooth out, but I like what I have so far. Each mold (M and F) is about a 30 hour print.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by David J. Beaulieu on
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Dan, the purpose of a male and female mold?
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Permalink Reply by Daniel Niendorff on
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I got to that method mostly by experimenting with other methods that did not produce good results for me. To produce a nicely finished piece, the female mold is the important side - it produces the finish. But for the female mold to do it’s job, an even pressure must be applied over the entire female mold surface. For a more “open” mold vacuum bagging has worked really well for me, but I think it would be pretty tough to vacuum bag a mold that was open on two end. It’s like trying to vacuum bag the inside of a donut hole. One could close one end and then cut it off later, but that would make some difficult angles also that might be hard to work with. The male mold applies perfectly even pressure and makes a good finish on both sides of the part. And it is pretty easy to make once the part is designed in Solidworks. So instead of vacuum bagging this one, I just put the male and female molds in a press and squeeze. I’ve had really good luck with this method.
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Permalink Reply by Norm Neuls on
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The strut/wing and strut/fuselage ends could sure use some fairings if for no other reason than aesthetic On the 750 STOL you'll never see a difference in the airspeed indicator. I'll be interested to follow your progress. .
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I’m sure that the ASI will hesitate to budge at all. For me this is an extension of a strut fairing install; my 801 has round tube struts. The strut fairings will make a difference on this one. I’m doing the junction fairing somewhat for aesthetic reasons. A little bit in the hopes of a hint more airspeed. Somewhat because it’s a handy project to build composite skills. But mostly just for fun. I’ll follow up with some pictures of how they turn out when I finish them.
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Got them painted today......
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I ended up doing a straight female mold and vacuum bag setup. I made the male molds, but the offset ended up wrong. So rather than remake them, I blocked the ends and did a regular setup which worked fine in this case.....
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Very crafty!! This is on my list of things to learn how to do... nicely done!
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