Poor man's heating pad

[mikes]

I swear someone posted a thread awhile back about the idea of pulling the wires out of an electric blanket and running the wires closer together on something like aluminum or silicone mat. I searched and searched but can't find the post.

Anyway, I have a king size electric blanket that I use to warm curing epoxy while vacuum bagging. The thing is a pain, huge and floppy, and gets dust everywhere. So I'm thinking of tearing it apart and making my own "poor mans" heating pad. I just want it to get up around 100 F or so. I can get silicone heat mat, just need to figure out what kind of glue to use, and to figure out if it's a waste of time (or not)

Your thoughts?
Mike S

I know I should throw down $$ for a real silicon heating blanket but...

[hugocacola]

hey if you are using vacum is better make a rounfing box and put a buf buf warm stuff breader puting air inside, is like people of skimboards do...

[Greg]

I did the same thing as you are talking about. The first time I used the heating blanket (twin size from Sears) I used the whole thing and folded it up. As you experienced, it is a real pain to get it folded right. So, I just ripped it apart, then made a new blanket from the old one, except that I only made the blanket as wide as the press, and I just wrapped the wires around a bunch of times. It worked quite well, and I could get the press surprisingly warm (around 100 to 120 F, or around 40-50 C).

Ripping the old blanket apart and sewing the new one took about 20 minutes, but it made everything so much easier during layup. Compared to the other things in skibuilding, this job was quick and easy.

So, the point is, it isn't a waste of time at all. and like I said, I just used the same blanket material that was original blanket came with. I highly recommend this method, and in fact, I plan on doing it again with my next vacuum press.