I ramped it up to 100c in 15 mins then cooked it for 10 mins. Then pulled it at 80c
The one in the middle I built today
DIY Silicone Heat Blanket
Moderators: Head Monkey, kelvin, bigKam, skidesmond, chrismp
Looking great !
I have been cooking the sicomin at 80C for 75 minutes after ramping for 30 minutes (only one blanket though). Cure time at 100C for 10 min gives glass transition temp of 104c and 20 minutes Tg of 113C. At. 80 for 75 min Tg should be 103. I get nervous about all that heat and my MDF mold. Cooking a board in 25 minutes would be pretty sweet though !
Again boards are looking sweet! Heading to Japan again ?
I have been cooking the sicomin at 80C for 75 minutes after ramping for 30 minutes (only one blanket though). Cure time at 100C for 10 min gives glass transition temp of 104c and 20 minutes Tg of 113C. At. 80 for 75 min Tg should be 103. I get nervous about all that heat and my MDF mold. Cooking a board in 25 minutes would be pretty sweet though !
Again boards are looking sweet! Heading to Japan again ?
Don't wait up, I'm off to kill Summer....
Cheers guys.
I was in Qld so I went to lavender and bought 12kg of it which was all they had. I put in an order for another 30kg. I love this resin, making one big batch is so easy compared to lots of small ones. I havent flexed the board but it seems more snappy than the ones I built with west/room temp.
I lost a lot of resin out the side of the mold when it started to warm up so I must be putting too much in I think.
I didnt have any problems with heat, the mdf seems fine with it.
I am going to japan in 33 days for 2 months, 2 weeks in tokyo to meet my gf's parents and all her friends which should be interesting lol. Then 6 weeks roaming honshu chasing powder.
Im starting to get nervous lol.
I was in Qld so I went to lavender and bought 12kg of it which was all they had. I put in an order for another 30kg. I love this resin, making one big batch is so easy compared to lots of small ones. I havent flexed the board but it seems more snappy than the ones I built with west/room temp.
I lost a lot of resin out the side of the mold when it started to warm up so I must be putting too much in I think.
I didnt have any problems with heat, the mdf seems fine with it.
I am going to japan in 33 days for 2 months, 2 weeks in tokyo to meet my gf's parents and all her friends which should be interesting lol. Then 6 weeks roaming honshu chasing powder.
Im starting to get nervous lol.
Forrest paints shipped me some of their 318 hardener by accident. 5:1 ratio. Cures in 12-15 min at 160-190f. Had to work a bit faster but everything was cured in 15 min. It was kind of sweet to have it done so fast. The 032 hardener takes more like 25 min to cure.
Fighting gravity on a daily basis
www.Whiteroomcustomskis.com
www.Whiteroomcustomskis.com
Ok so I am working on making a heat blanket.
At the moment I am trying to figure out which wire to buy I have found some that is 8.36 ohm per ft or 27ohms per m
so I'm planning on 4m circuits and having 10 of those
so my resistance is 110ohms per circuit.
divided by 10 means 11 ohms total for blanket.
Canadian household voltage 110
110^2 is 12100
12100/11=1100 watts
will this be sufficient for one blanket.
will this wire work for me
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Kanthal-A1-wire ... 5658be7e92
At the moment I am trying to figure out which wire to buy I have found some that is 8.36 ohm per ft or 27ohms per m
so I'm planning on 4m circuits and having 10 of those
so my resistance is 110ohms per circuit.
divided by 10 means 11 ohms total for blanket.
Canadian household voltage 110
110^2 is 12100
12100/11=1100 watts
will this be sufficient for one blanket.
will this wire work for me
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Kanthal-A1-wire ... 5658be7e92
Ok so I have everything ready go just have one question. It Looks like troublemaker makes two pieces (cures a top and bottom of a mat) and then lays out the wires in the middle then silicones it together? or are people just laying 10oz glass down then wires and 10 oz on top and silicone it all at once (one step kinda)?
I made.two mats using the two step process. It worked quite.well. Just like.troblemakers vid. Be sure to work the silicone in well to avoid voids underneath. I think he used a sheet metal base. I used melamine and it worked great. I used mold release, but I'm not sure it's needed.
I posted some.pics that show the wire layout.
second step I spread silicone up to the nails, layed the top mat down and rolled it out. Also squeegeed with a wide drywall knife. I let it set a few hours(slow cur silicone)and then removed the nails to silicone the ends
I posted some.pics that show the wire layout.
second step I spread silicone up to the nails, layed the top mat down and rolled it out. Also squeegeed with a wide drywall knife. I let it set a few hours(slow cur silicone)and then removed the nails to silicone the ends
Dutch heatblanket
Thank you all very much for all the info! I was able to make my own heatblanket very easy: 600 grams/m2 triax, 15.6 ohm resistancewire (Conrad.de) moldmax 60.
Put the whole thing under vacuum with peelply, perforated film and bleeder, perfect result.
Put the whole thing under vacuum with peelply, perforated film and bleeder, perfect result.
Thick Blanket
OK, I gave it a shot, but I'm not sure that my first blanket is a go. Any help would be appreciated. Here's the details:
-9oz biax fiberglass
-50A silicone mold rubber
-5ohm nichrome wire
1st attempt:
-I first laid the fiberglass over a sheet of melamine. Measured everything out. Placed nails to string the wire as many have done. I figured out that I could not solder directly to the nichrome wire, but found that if I twist the nichrome wire with the braided copper, the copper would "drink" up enough solder to get a very solid solder to the nichrome.
-I taped the wire down with the sheetrock tape. When pulling the nails, the nichrome wire curled and pulled the tape right up. I spent some time trying to get it to work, but ended up ditching this and starting over. That batch of nichrome wire is now in a big ball.
2nd attempt:
-I laid the fiberglass over the melamine and mixed up some silicone. Spread 500 grams (plus hardener so 550g total) over the fiberglass and thought there was no way that was enough to soak the glass. Mixed another 500, spread it out and let cure.
-Some areas looked thin on that sheet, so I laid down the 2nd sheet of fiberglass and mixed about 1300g of silicone. Spread that out and thought it looked good.
-nailed up the thinner sheet and wired it up with nichrome wire. Placed tape over the wires noticing that it didn't stick to the silicone, but did stick to the wires so I thought it was still helping.
- I cut the heads off of each nail so that I could lay the 2nd sheet over the top to help hold the wires down.
- Mixed another 550g of silicone (200, then 200, then 150) and spread that over the wires and tape. Laid the top sheet over the whole sandwich punching through the nails. Pulled the nails and laid the 2nd piece of melamine over the whole thing. Requisite Volkswagen wheels over the top of the whole thing for weight.
Here's where the 2nd one went wrong. Obviously the whole thing is WAY too thick. It doesn't roll up at all, but more bends at weak points. It might have worked, but being that thick I'm not sure how durable it would be once it starts to kink and such. The main problem is that I plugged it into the light socket (it's wired for 220v, so 110 at the socket is about 700 watt vs 2800 watts at 220v) and I could see that the wire in my last circuit slipped and crossed over it's self. It runs the length of the blanket 6 times, so the crossing over shortens that circuit and increases the wattage of that circuit significantly. I'll test it on an actual controller, but I think this one is a waste.
My questions.
- Are folks having similar issues with the wire wanting to curl up? I tried to straiten it out as much as possible. The stuff I used came on a small spool and that might be my problem.
- Are people having better luck making two sheets, then wiring up wire in between, then a 3rd layer of silicone to glue it together? silicone it all at once? I though all at once would be the best, but how do you really get the wires to quit moving once you pull the nails?
Thanks for the help. Sorry for the long post.
-9oz biax fiberglass
-50A silicone mold rubber
-5ohm nichrome wire
1st attempt:
-I first laid the fiberglass over a sheet of melamine. Measured everything out. Placed nails to string the wire as many have done. I figured out that I could not solder directly to the nichrome wire, but found that if I twist the nichrome wire with the braided copper, the copper would "drink" up enough solder to get a very solid solder to the nichrome.
-I taped the wire down with the sheetrock tape. When pulling the nails, the nichrome wire curled and pulled the tape right up. I spent some time trying to get it to work, but ended up ditching this and starting over. That batch of nichrome wire is now in a big ball.
2nd attempt:
-I laid the fiberglass over the melamine and mixed up some silicone. Spread 500 grams (plus hardener so 550g total) over the fiberglass and thought there was no way that was enough to soak the glass. Mixed another 500, spread it out and let cure.
-Some areas looked thin on that sheet, so I laid down the 2nd sheet of fiberglass and mixed about 1300g of silicone. Spread that out and thought it looked good.
-nailed up the thinner sheet and wired it up with nichrome wire. Placed tape over the wires noticing that it didn't stick to the silicone, but did stick to the wires so I thought it was still helping.
- I cut the heads off of each nail so that I could lay the 2nd sheet over the top to help hold the wires down.
- Mixed another 550g of silicone (200, then 200, then 150) and spread that over the wires and tape. Laid the top sheet over the whole sandwich punching through the nails. Pulled the nails and laid the 2nd piece of melamine over the whole thing. Requisite Volkswagen wheels over the top of the whole thing for weight.
Here's where the 2nd one went wrong. Obviously the whole thing is WAY too thick. It doesn't roll up at all, but more bends at weak points. It might have worked, but being that thick I'm not sure how durable it would be once it starts to kink and such. The main problem is that I plugged it into the light socket (it's wired for 220v, so 110 at the socket is about 700 watt vs 2800 watts at 220v) and I could see that the wire in my last circuit slipped and crossed over it's self. It runs the length of the blanket 6 times, so the crossing over shortens that circuit and increases the wattage of that circuit significantly. I'll test it on an actual controller, but I think this one is a waste.
My questions.
- Are folks having similar issues with the wire wanting to curl up? I tried to straiten it out as much as possible. The stuff I used came on a small spool and that might be my problem.
- Are people having better luck making two sheets, then wiring up wire in between, then a 3rd layer of silicone to glue it together? silicone it all at once? I though all at once would be the best, but how do you really get the wires to quit moving once you pull the nails?
Thanks for the help. Sorry for the long post.
Guys I am in need of some assistance, I have pm'd troublemaker but he doesn't seem to be around any more unfortunately, the guy is a wealth of knowledge and hopefully he comes back soon.
Anyway I built some very successful heat mats using the specs that he worked out for me. These were built for 240vac power and heat up to 100c in about 15 mins.
Now I need to build some for 100vac power. Is it even possible to have a mat that performs the same way from 100vac?
If someone could run some calculations that would be awesome.
Below is a screenshot of the details troublemaker gave me. This was using
NICHROME RESISTANCE WIRE 100GM ROLL 26SWG 0.45MM
6.645 ohms per metre
Thanks
Anyway I built some very successful heat mats using the specs that he worked out for me. These were built for 240vac power and heat up to 100c in about 15 mins.
Now I need to build some for 100vac power. Is it even possible to have a mat that performs the same way from 100vac?
If someone could run some calculations that would be awesome.
Below is a screenshot of the details troublemaker gave me. This was using
NICHROME RESISTANCE WIRE 100GM ROLL 26SWG 0.45MM
6.645 ohms per metre
Thanks
Mine was .34mm thick. I think the slight bit thicker didn't help. Plus it came on a thin spool. I'll get some thinner wire and give it another go.chrismp wrote:The wires we use are 0.2-0.3mm in thickness, so no problems with curly wires. As for soldering, you can sand the ends of the wires lightly with some sandpaper to remove some of the coating which should make them easy to solder.
Are others using a similar process of making two silicone/fiber sheets, then wire up and secure it all together with more silicone?
Your 1905mm x 330mm matt with 6.65 ohm/m, 100v... (really 100?, not 120?)gozaimaas wrote:Anyway I built some very successful heat mats using the specs that he worked out for me. These were built for 240vac power and heat up to 100c in about 15 mins.
Now I need to build some for 100vac power. Is it even possible to have a mat that performs the same way from 100vac?
If someone could run some calculations that would be awesome.
Below is a screenshot of the details troublemaker gave me. This was using
NICHROME RESISTANCE WIRE 100GM ROLL 26SWG 0.45MM
6.645 ohms per metre
Thanks
You could do 4 legs per run (instead of 6), 11.4mm spacing with 7 circuits. You'd be at 1375 Watts, 13.75 amps. US typical circuits can handle 15 amps, so that would be the max output here. If you can go to 15.73 amps, then do 8 circuits at 10mm spacing.
Check your resistance after you wire it up. 7 circuits should give you 7.27 ohms, 8 circuits 6.36 ohms.
Your wattage is limited by the voltage circuit, so it won't heat up as quickly, but should work.
After my experience above, the .45mm wire seems thick. Then again I should give electrical advice only until I have a successful blanket. 2nd try hopefully...