Ooooh, Whats That?

One of my short term goals is to build a carbon fiber frame so whenever I am not working on someone else's frame I play around with carbon to learn a little about it.  I have very little experience with it so I can't offer much advice but I can tell you with confidence that you don't want to breath a lot of this stuff, I don't want to breath any of it.  As fun as it is to make stuff with carbon fiber, wet layup can be very messy and sanding the cured parts is even worse.  Get yourself a good breathing mask and wear long sleeve shirts and pants unless your a glutton for punishment.  This is just some PVC pipe to practice wrapping my joints before I start using the expensive stuff.  I bonded them together with  some ScotchWeld DP420 and then mixed up a little batch with some cut-up carbon tow to make a thick paste.  Having a good fillet at the tube juncture will help the carbon patches lay better. I don't think those little craters in the fillet are a total deal breaker because they will be filled when the layered carbon is laid down, however they won't be on the next parts because I will pack it tighter. I am fixing to order a vacuum pump so that I can learn to vac-bag the layups for a stronger part.  I am not breaking any new ground here, there are plenty of people out there who could teach classes about this stuff, but its fun experimenting with something you know nothing about.  I never paid attention in Science class, all I did was dream about riding motocross.  Isn't that the way its supposed to be, use your body when your young and strong and after your 40 you can start to use your brain. Thats how I chose to do it anyway.  Just think, LOOK was making bicycles with this stuff 30 years ago.   Anyway, I'll  post some more photos  as I go along and maybe sometime this spring I will have something rideable.  I doubt anything will ever ride as smooth as steel but as the Pixies once wrote, 

"ITS EDUCATIONAL".