Wondering what the best methods are for bonding rails to foam core. We are constructing under vacume and plan to do two lay-ups core/rails and top, bottom/core but have a couple of questions about the rail lay-up as it seems not to be going well (de-lam&separation).

- We have tried a few lay-ups with polyethylene and been unsuccessful, any pointers here?
- What is the best rail material for bonding to divinycell?
- We are considering abs, any lay-up pointers here?

Additionally, with the construction noted, any additional suggestions (i.e. successful materials, weaves, weights?).


Ride smart/Ride safe!

you not using polyethylene as rails are you?

that stuff won't bond to anything....

use the abs or pvc for rails...

ya...the polyethylene did not and will not bond for beans.

any tips for pvc or abs rail bonding?

thanks

unfortunately i've not built a board with Abs or pvc rails..

tho i believe the process is:

for bonding....just rough the pvc with 60 grit sandpaper

or abs...rough and then flame with a gas torch prior to bonding for even better bond...

always do small dummy runs....test samples first...

trying to bond polyethylene, thats class.

short of PTFE or vesconite it's about the hardest plastic to bond to anything.

give eddy-diffusivity a PM, he knows his rail materials,,,

Thanks for that.The reason we decided to try polyethylene was that,as I read it in some of the north board construction,the tips were HDPE (High density polyethylene)which is what i ordered and what we tried.so we found out it didn't work and that north must have made a type'o or it's secret code for something else.gonna try abs,as there has been lots of success.thanks for all the info.
Cheers,G

hdpe, theres loads of different specs, but for the most part people usually mean ultra high molecular weight polyethylene UHMWPE, the stuff snowboard bases are made out of, very unsticky, needs a special 3m two pack glue and flamed surface treatment to bond correctly.

so i'd be very surprised it thats what north meant....maybe they were just using it as a base layer, for grinding up stuff, slingshot used to use it as do lightwave.

try ABS, or try pouring them from polyurethane.

Tognar (http://www.tognar.com/) supply sintered UHMWPE for just that, (snowboards).
One side is prepared and its peel strength is very high when used with an epoxy. Its only a few mm thick though.

I use UD carbon prepreg in thin strips wrapped round the core edge & processed with the rest of the lay-up under vacuum in an oven. It gives a very solid rail that can be rubbed down and polished into the top cover.



The final result can be seen http://hartland.org.uk/ckb/images10/fixstrap.jpg

I use to bond rail (forex, it's expanded pvc) with contact glue (bostick) or hot glue, some frieds had great succes wit cianoacrilate (superglue)

You can also try with tangit, a special glue for pvc, abs