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VIDEO TUTORIAL

Sustainable Composites - Resin Infused Skateboard Using Flax and Bio Resin

In this video tutorial we use quite a fun project, the creation of a skateboard deck, to demonstrate how easy it can be to work with some of the more environmentally friendly, sustainable materials available from Easy Composites.

We create a simple, temporary mould using some basic OSB wooden board in combination with 'Foamex' sheet (commonly by sign makers and screen printers) where we use wedges to curve the foam sheet to create the double-curvature (camber and concave) typical of a longboard skateboard deck. The PVC 'Foamex' sheet is prepared with CR1 Easy-Lease Chemical Release Agent to prevent the deck from sticking to the 'Foamex'.

The core for the deck is made by running some planks of wood recycled from old shipping pallets through the saw and then assembling them into a sheet using dots of hot-melt glue, making sure to leave gaps between each strip to allow the resin to pass from one side of the core to the other side.

Reinforcement for the deck with a layer of Flax Fibre Twill Weave 550g cloth as the top and bottom layer providing strength, a 'damping' property and the great natural appearance of the flax fibre. Additional reinforcement for the deck comes from a layer of 650gsm Unidirectional Carbon Fibre Tape followed by a layer of 300gsm +/- 45 Biaxial Carbon Fibre. The reinforcement is mirrored either side of the core to create a 'balanced' laminate.

The dry laminate and core are then vacuum bagged to the mould surface ready for resin infusion using all of the materials and equipment included in our Resin Infusion Starter Kit or available in the our Vacuum Bagging Consumables or Vacuum Bagging Equipment section of our website.

For the resin infusion itself, we use a special low viscosity IB2 Epoxy Bio Resin which is ideal for resin infusion and lends excellent mechanical properties to the finished board too.

TUTORIAL BREAKDOWN

1. Wood strip core

In this case, we are using wooden planks from broken pallets to make the wood core. Selecting planks of about the right size, we cut them into thin strips. These thin strips were then glued together with small dots of hot melt glue, taking care to leave a small gap between each strip of wood. This gap is essential for the infusion resin to be able to pass to the bottom side of the core during the infusion itself.

2. Simple mould

We have fabricated the mould as this is a one off project. It was desirable to get a nice curve in both directions to give the skateboard the shape it needs. To do this we bent a thin piece of OSB wooden board over some wedges and blocks spaced to give the desired curve. We then screwed the OSB down to a stable base to hold its shape.

To give a nice smooth mould surface, a layer of "Foamex" sign board style sheet was bonded over the OSB surface. This gives a good smooth layer from which to mould from.

3. Apply release agent

For this mould we have chosen to use our EasyLease Chemical Release Agent on the surface. This is applied with a lint free cloth building up the coats allowing 15 minutes between coats and a final hour before use after the last coat.

Once this was done, to avoid any trapped fibres or dirt, we applied the gum tape now before laying up the materials.

4. Visual Details

At this stage, you can decorate the first layer of fabric to give any visual effect you wish. In this case we used two thin stripes of Spread Tow Carbon Fibre ribbon and made a company logo stencil template which was spray painted onto the fabric.

5. Reinforcement and core

The layup of this project was the previously decorated 500gsm flax fibre as a top and bottom layer. Additional material comes from a layer of 600gsm Unidirectional carbon tape and a layer of biaxial carbon cloth. The layup is mirrored either side of the core.

The natural fibres, as well as strength, add a nice damping property to the board as well as the natural fibre credentials and unique look.

6. Vacuum consumables

The bagging stack used for this infusion is entirely standard for resin infusion and includes the peel ply layer, infusion mesh, spiral and silicone connectors, finally sealed with the vacuum bagging material. Ensure there are enough pleats in the tape and bagging material so that there is enough bagging film as the vacuum is pulled down. The vacuum line is then connected to the pump via the catch pot and the resin feed clamped off ready to be inserted into a pot of resin.

The next stage is to pull a vacuum on the bag, stopping in places, to adjust the bagging material and pleats to get the film where it needs to go. Once a full vacuum is achieved, conduct a leak test. The gum tape may need to be pressed firmly down to achieve a good seal. Once the leak test has been done, the bag is ready to be infused.

7. Resin infusion

Now that the bag has been leak tested, weight out and mix the resin ready for the infusion. The resin feed line is inserted into the resin pot and secured so it cannot move. The clamp on the resin feed is then opened allowing the resin to flow.

Once the resin has fully infused the part, the vacuum line can be clamped, followed shortly after by the resin feed. Once both lines are clamped, the pump can be switched off and the skate board left to fully cure.

8. Demould cured deck

Now the deck has fully cured, it can be demoulded. The bagging film is easily removed. The mesh and peel ply required a bit more effort to remove, wearing gloves so that the sharp shards of resin do not cause any injury. Once the bagging stack has been removed, the deck itself can be demoulded from the temporary mould.

9. Trim and fettle

Using the original card template, the deck can be marked out with a marker pen before being cut out with a jigsaw. Using a Sanding block, the rough cut edge is then neatened and fettled to get the exact shape we wanted. The wheel wells are also sanded to shape. Finally the edges are finished off with 120 grit paper to finish them off.

The board was measured to locate the position for the trucks. Once happy with the position, the fixing holes were marked by pen and then drilled.

10. Apply grip-tape

We measured and marked out the grip tape to fit the board including some grip tape stripes to fit in with the rest of the design. Then the tape was cut and fitted to the board in the normal way and the edges tidied and finished.

11. Fit trucks

The final stage in completing the board is to fit and bolt on the trucks in the pre-drilled holes. Once secured, the skate board is complete.

DISCUSSION (13)

Please share any questions or comments you may have about this video tutorial.

Joe Thomas

Can the release agent be applied directly to an MDF mold?

Easy Composites› Matt

If you want to get a release of MDF then you'll need to use LOTS of coats of Shellac Sanding Sealer (available from timber merchants/furniture restorers/hardware stores) which will allow you to properly seal and polish the porous surface of the MDF. After this, it's possible to use mould release wax or chemical release agent to get a release from MDF.

Gunn Gin

Is it possible to use this method to infuse resin into a wood laminate?

Easy Composites› Matt

It would depend on the wood. Traditional wood stabilisation is not done this way although the principles of working under a vacuum to remove the air and thus allow the resin to displace where the air was is similar. Typically that is done in a vat of slow curing resin in a pressure pot; the positive pressure drives the resin into the wood.

Stobi

Would you be able to use a material like plexiglass instead of wood as a core?

Easy Composites› Matt

You could experiment with all sorts of core materials. Plexiglass I guess you're thinking of clear acrylic? - I'm not sure what results you'd get from this combination, bonding to acrylic is tricky and you might well have issues with the laminate delaminating from an acrylic core but it could be worth experimenting.

Roman Malyarenko

Could i use a full(uncut) 9mm Baltic birch plywood as core material but with holes drilled so resin could soak in?

Easy Composites› Matt

I see no reason why that wouldn't work. You might want to score between the holes on the bottom side to help give the resin more paths once it reaches the bottom layer.

Diego Sahagun

How can you make this skateboard hollow? Is there anyway to do a resin infusion but hollow? Obviously with no holes on the surface.

Easy Composites› Matt

Actually hollow wouldn't be possible without making it in two halves but you could use a very low density core, that would pretty-much behave like it's hollow and be a whole lot simpler.

Fish

What's the point in the core? Couldn't you have used something stiffer and thinner like plastic or metal to get a ridiculously thin board?

Easy Composites› Matt

There's lot of different ways you could build a board up. The point of the video was to showcase using natural fibres and recycled wood as a core; as it happens, wood is still probably a more suitable core material for a skateboard deck that most materials. Certainly a metal core wouldn't be particularly suitable, it's incredibly dense and so not really an appropriate 'core' material but by all means experiment with some different materials and see how they affect the outcome.

4-tro

I would really love to build a board by myself, can you give me some geometrical data for the board? I do like the design and size of the board.

Easy Composites› Matt

It was just a free form design, no real thought went into the shape and size but it did feel about right to ride. Just experiment yourself, that's the fun of making your own board!

Martin Mihalik

I'm planning a downhill/race longboard using 5mm EasyCell75, UD carbon and +-45 biax and woven carbon. What gsm/weight carbon fibre would be right?

Easy Composites› Matt

typically many people would go for a 2/2 twill fabric at 200gsm which is roughly 0.25mm thick per layer. You could follow a similar layup as in the video and replace the Flax Fibre with 2 or 3 layers of the 200gsm carbon cloth. Ultimately your design might vary depending on how strong you need it to be and with a thinner core perhaps more layers compared to ours but that should give you a rough idea to start from.

Tony Lorentzen

Would it be possible to infuse some electrically conductive wires into the board for an electric skateboard or is the resin and carbon fibre electrically conductive itself?

Easy Composites› Matt

Epoxy resin isn't electrically conductive but carbon fibre is so it is possible to achieve conductivity through the laminate (although not in a perfect sense owing to insulating properties of the resin) so it depends on what level of conductivity you need and the direction you need it in; carbon will only conduct down the length of the fibres in a laminate like this. If you do need to lay conductive wires in then you could certainly do so.

O.Rothe

Not sure if carbon fiber is the way to go all the time. For longboards you usually want a certain degree of bending. So if you're not 150kg you'd probably prefer a glass fibre longboard.

Easy Composites› Matt

It also depends on the other materials used. In this case, the Flax does not offer a lot of stiffness to the laminate so balancing it out with the stiffer carbon fibre probably means overall the balance works out about right for many cases. The finished longboard handled well from our own rider's perspective.

mirceaandreighinea

how the resin will react with wool? cotton? or materials found in sport socks - like Polyester (Coolmax), Polyamide (Nylon), Elastomero (Lycra)? will them make a decent bond, a decent structural rigidity?

Easy Composites› Matt

We have not experimented with any modern clothing fibres. We suspect that for many, the resin would wet out and cure in the normal sense, however the structural benefits would only really be found out from experimentation as it is not something we have seen before.

Brad B

Did the wood core soak up a lot of resin? I work making guitars by resin infusion, and would like to try doing a longboard. The guitars are only 4 ply of CF and fiberglass. How much resin and hardener did the longboard take?

Easy Composites› Matt

The wood soaked up almost no resin but the gaps between the strips of wood did consume some resin. The longboard used about 1kg of resin, I'm afraid we didn't record the exact amount.

Top Side

I'm build little Camper Vans like tear-drops; I've been looking for something that's not fibreglass to be the outer skin. The area is large; like 9.6 by 4 foot! I'm hoping to achieve a 'sand bag' look. This process looks like it could be perfect?

Easy Composites› Matt

Great idea. You can actually infuse just about anything, coffee sacks, denim, old bed sheets! Flax does have a really nice natural look. You'll need to use some other types of reinforcement too (probably glass), to provide the structural strength.