Modern Fibers in Surfboard Laminates (Cerex and Others)

General Discussion
81

Hi Huie,

One year on and this is where we are at,

Nylon 6,6 differs from fiberglass is different aspects. 

Nylon 6,6 is less expensive.

It can be dyed to color.

It has greater abrasion resistance.

It is better at ding/ impact resistance.

It comes woven and non woven.

Cerex makes a non woven N-Fusion surfacing veil.

Surfacing veils are great for creating a smoother surface than a woven cloth, but if used as a surfacing veil, bagging is a must since you can’t sand it.

Cramer makes woven Nylon 6,6

Cordura Nylon 6,6 comes in many different weights, but bound with treatments, that make it perform like a non woven.

Cordura has a balistic weave, designed for bullet proof vests and the like. And the ballistic weave is stiffer than an equal weight of non ballistic weave cloth.

Woven fabrics drape, while non woven need relief cutting.

Nylon tends to soak/ swell with resin, so a wet out table and vacuum bagging is important, but not necessary.

It doesn’t sand well, so if you are hand laminating, a fiberglass top layer is needed.

It is more elastic, so it creates a better bond against flexible foam than fiberglass,

Cerex N-Fusion comes titanium white, so no yellowing.

Fiberglass has better appearance if you arr doing a wooden board, and you want the wood grain from below to show.  Nylon, while can be dyed to color, or even dyed white, is a little “milky” in appearance.

 

I’m sure there is more, but thats a quick list of what comes to mind right now.

 

 

82

ea yea i could give you a six page reply

but in a year how do u  evaluate these statments in regards to surfboards  i have seen no evidence you are applying this to surfboards and testing them over a period of time?

 

tell me about the cordura what have you done with it what weights

polyester net is real tough in the laminate  but shit cosmetics good for patches under cork

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 iam about to build an all nylon board   who knows?

 

cheers huie

83

I will too huie only one way to realy find out, make it and surf it.  Everysurfer , just to be clear woven is stronger than nonwoven?

84

As for more real world boards, ask Ghettorat how they lasted.  He said he used Cerex on a bunch of boards as a layer against the foam.  There are others from Florida who I have been told are using it.  I was told this by a ding repair guy who fixes them.

My work schedule is about to lighten up, so I plan to have a couple done for Plaskett Creek camp-out.  We should get ride reports then.

85

It seems that woven is stronger than non woven for impact.  Non woven is thinner and smoother than woven, so against foam, might be better for delamination.

Woven nylon 6,6 is stronger than woven fiberglass for dings.  Non woven really swells with epoxy.  The treated Cordura doesn’t seem to absorb epoxy so swells less.  The treated Cordura, since it doesn’t absorb epoxy, and wet out, must be applied differently than standard cloth.  Must be wetted on both sides.

An important note!  All the Nylon I’m using is Nylon 6,6 and not regular nylon cloth.  Don’t just go to the fabric store.

86

Thanks for the heads up, will have to wait till I get my package fron cerex, said he was going to send me 30 yds.

87

Nylon, patented by Dupont de Nemours, is polyamide 6-6, 6 carbon atom on each side of amine group. Current nylon use as textil is nylon 6-6, other kind of “nylon” have in general other name, for exemple nylon 6 is Perlon.

Nylon have low Rt, low G and high elasticity thats why it’s give poor performance laminate (in traction). Specific kind of nylon for composits are polyaramide (kevlar).

Nylon works in laminate in flexion because its’ light and give a “thick” coat of resin that improve bond when against foam and bulk laminate wich increase stiffness…

88

Hi Lemat,

When you say poor performance in “traction”, do you mean in “tension”?

In a complex shape, like aircraft, tension would be important, to keep the wings from tearing off.  But in a surfboard, the main job of the skin is to keep the water out, and not puncture when impacted against rocks and things.  Resiliency is important.

If greater tension resistance is needed, then add enough bias fibers of a stronger tensile material to the skin.  Can be fiberglass or others.

89

 

Woops !

90

double Woops!

91

Nylon Smylon…

If youre going to laminate using nylon or plastics of any kind youd better put away your good old RR kwik Kick  or 2000 based epoxies and opt for some of the thinner more flexible infusion products that RR supply.     You have to match the resin  flexibility with the outer skin material.

If the laminate is a flexible  plastic of some form, the resin needs to be more elastic in nature… If your laminate is Carbon then that`s another ball of wax…

Glass-less boards should be relativly easy to do , you just need the right plastics and the right resins…

Coil has it well figured out…   Huies getting hip to the concept...... Its just a matter of time, but mark my words… Fiberglass laminated surfboards will be just a memory in the future… Unless you`re building …  tried and true… old school  … IMHO…

VH.

92

If VH is right about the epoxy being important, anybody want to do a joint experiment?  Do matching testing of various epoxys?  Same cloth, same backing, same wet out. All vaccum bagged

If anyone wants to contribute 10 grams of epoxy and matching hardiner, I’ll run the test.  I’ll supply the Fiberglass Hawaii sample.  Anyone want to contribute some RR?  Lets try all their mixes.

P.M. me if you have some to share.  I travel between Malibu and Santa Barbara, to meet up.

93

Resin Research epoxies cover a wide range of flex stiffnesses.  I’m sure they sell something that would work.  

 

I’m getting ready to do a longboard with a veneer for a friend of mine.  If I can figure it out I intend to take a swing at Huie’s infused wood + nylon net + flexible resin program.  

94

For a well design composit that work in traction, resin MUST have an higher elongation to break than fiber if you want the max perf of your composit. Much more important than fiber ratio. In fact If resin well choice ratio plays play almost as weight.

But again, in surfboards, composits suffers from flexion and buckling flexion from impact efforts, that’s way resin play an even greater role…

You can had flexibilizer (glycol) in you resin to increase elongation to break (but reduce stiffness), it’s increase notably toughness but in “standard thin skin way” (and even more by vacuum bag) you will have chewingum skin: soft but tough.

Sorry for my franglish

95

I’ve been following this thread with much interest, curious to see where it goes, but hesitant to involve myself.  I don’t have much to offer in the way of experience.  As a composites enthusiast (whatever that means) and well-wishing observer, I’d like to respectfully offer a couple thoughts.

  1. Pay attention to the advise you’ve received from those who know more, however cryptic (huie, g-rat,etc. . .) or linguistically challenging it might be.  Lemat knows his stuff.

  2. While I’m sure you’ve already done plenty of reading, I suggest doing more.  The time and money you’ll invest in reading a book or three is far less than what you could spend making crappy test parts (though I’m not suggesting you shouldn’t make test samples).

A favorite of mine (thanks to Greg Tate for suggesting this one): Understanding Aircraft Composite Construction by Zeke Smith.

As far as using non-traditional fibers and alternate construction methods, the sky’s the limit.  There’s a million ways to skin a cat.  In the end it’s a surfboard, so it needs to do it’s job well and be worth more than the sum of it’s parts when completed.

That’s my 2 cents.  If I’m out of line, don’t hesitate to say so.  I love a good Sway’s roast, even if it’s at my expense.

Best wishes to you in your efforts.

By all means, please have a lot of fun in the process.

96

Newschoolblue,

Don’t worry, no roast coming from me!

I agree with you on listening to others.  I got started by a talk with a buddy who used to make radar domes for Boeing.  He got me onto wet out tables.  Mike Daniel got me thinking when he said Coil boards don’t use fiberglass.  Huie drops hints from time to time. 

Book learning is good too.  Also the internet. 

I’ve gotten some help from the people selling the materials.  My crappy samples really don’t cost anything.  If you contact a vendor who is selling something, and you say you would like to try some out, most are willing to send you samples for free.  I’ve gotten Nylon Woven, and non woven, Twaron woven and roving, Cordura swatches, and Carbon unidirectional this way.  And the vendors don’t mind at all.  I got my first free samples of Cerex.  Since that time, I’ve been telling everone about it, and bought a larger roll myself.  So for a few yard sample they gave me, they have sold thousands of yards.  The next fibers I’m going to start with are Nylon 6,6 from Cramer Fabrics.  They gave me 10 yards for free, and it is so much better than fiberglass for strength!  Cordura too!

But you also have to keep an eye out for misinformation.  Sometimes, I think just for their own amusement, posters give bad ideas.  Innegra was one of those.  A few posted their innegra boards, then later, when some tried it out and said it had problems, they posted that they stopped using it years ago, because it had too many problems. Kind of rough for those tricked!

But nobody making a living at it is really going to share their latest secret info.  And why would they?  It is putting food on their table, so why help the competition? 

Since you mentioned Lemat, you are right, he knows his stuff.  What is interesting is that he is going the opposite direction to Coil.  Coil goes ultra lean on their epoxy use, and instead goes high fiber content.  Lemat uses epoxy as a bulker, to use less fiber, but make the layers thicker.  Which one is right? I’ve no idea.  More samples will tell, I guess!

 

97

Hi,

I’ve seen some epoxy systems have a ‘plasticizer additive’ you can use to make them more flexible, I’m guessing this additive is glycol based then. Are there any rule of thumb for how much glycol to to add ie. % glycol for % increase in elongation to break?

98

Are you sure you really know what coil do ? They keep their proprietary process secret instead patented it, so they not say all… Nothing better than a good secret, and really better than a patent that do nothing because system already shown ( reference to another thread LOL).

I see photo of their grid process with accuarte description: there is fiberglass and a bulker to form a thick tough skin.

Nothing new but the right choose of tech and materials.

Be carrefull with internet, you can find many information not really wrong but not sufficiently precise. That’s why i only refer to true mechanical documents with starting hypothesis (i use and write some in my job).

You are right, test are necessary, but need a good protocol, most of my test are validated on laboratory mechanical test machine. I use solidworks + cosmos (elements finis) for simulation, most of my job is learning my students how to design properly mechanical parts with those tools, it’s my hobby too.

Speacking of strengh is not really valid because wich strengh ? Mechanical standard is traction strengh because test is easy, give E and Sigma to use in Rdm studdy of the system you design, with isotropic homogenous materials. But not for composit sandwich panels…

Lab 4 points flexural test results: specimen 1: epoxy resin RR2000, specimen 2: epoxy resin RR2000 + nonwoven polyester, both same dimension (thin). No real weight difference, no significative strengh difference. Same results with nylon and Polypro. theory explain: elongation to break of resin is too far from fiber one, in those flexural tests thickness of specimen is most important, at same “thin” thickness need a real big increase of E to increase strengh.

Sorry for my franglish.

99

Not too much because you have quickly chewing gum. Propylen glycol 5% of resin weight increase significatively elongation. Some real performant flexible epoxy resin are modify epoxy with kind of urethane function, perfs are near PU RIM resin.

100

LeMat, I absolutely enjoy your posts (and they are easier to understand than Ambrose’s much of the time, ha ha!!)  

Your “franglish” doesn’t bother me but once in a while I wish I could translate phrases like this better:

“give E and Sigma to use in Rdm studdy of the system you design, with isotropic homogenous materials.”

Sounds like Rdm is some kind of test (impact, friction, flex??), and I assume that E and Sigma are standard parameters of that test (thickness?  temp?), but I haven’t taken your class (or anything similar) so it’s all Greek to me.

(well, to sum up, the Sigma is anyway!)

Keep posting LeMat, much appreciated.  It’s good to bring the academic end of this stuff to Swaylocks too!