Carbon fibre wets out very easily. You paint the surface of the mould with resin then put the carbon fabric in the mould and squeegee, this forces the rein into the fabric. I found this method OK with plain weave, with unidirectional[UD] or twill it can work but you have to be very gentle.

I use a home made roller rather than a squeggee most of the time. The roller is a normal paddle roller modified. The paddle is replaced by a piece of rubber tube on a piece of stainless tube. The rubber tube is on a piece of steel tube as it makes it easier to rotate. This roller acts just like a squeegee, as its rotating instead of being dragged across the fibres it doesn't pull fibres out and make a mess.

Before laying up the fabric must be cut out, as the fabric is to be carefully shaped pieces, unlike the random bits used in the fibreglass mould, patterns are required before the fabric can be cut. I make the cutting patterns from Kraft paper, if you are careful with these they last quite a long time. It can be quite hard cutting a pattern for a piece of fabric, the pattern doesn't distort as the fabric will. You allow for this when you make the pattern, I try to get one edge correct then allow enough at the other to compensate for any discrepancies. Its very annoying finding you have cut a large piece of carbon 1/2" to small..

I Lay-up the carbon-resin on the bench on a piece of polythene, this means you can properly consolidate the rein-fabric. You can also fit the fabric into that awkward shape with ease. To try and reduce resin wastage I cut a piece of polythene slightly larger then the largest piece of carbon and lay up all the carbon on that piece.

The first layer of carbon that goes in the mould should be resin rich, and the entire surface should be wet, this will reduce the likelihood of pinholes. What's a "pinhole" well look at Figure1. You don't want laminates that look like this do you. you should also make sure there are no "stray" bits of fibre on the surface, I hate than a perfect finish marred by some scraps of fibre.

Lay up successive layer of carbon in a similar way, if the last layers are comparatively dry that doesn't usually matter, as long as there is enough resin in the lower layers to fill it; if you mixed enough resin when you vac the mould it should pull the rein into the fabric.

When all the fabric is in the mould make sure the fabric is pressed into all the corners, make sure the fabric isn't "bridging" parts of the mould. Either spend 10 minutes with gloved fingers consolidating the laminate or get it into a vacuum bag straight away and then make sure it, well consolidated it all corners.

If your using plain weave, it's easy to straighten the weave by pulling fibres straight, put your fingers, one each end of a fibre you want to straighten, press down and pull the fibre. By strigtening fibres it should be possible to correct any distortions in the weave. You have to be much more careful with twill though, it is possible to do some correction but it's much harder than with plain weave.

Suppliers.

• SPS general tools
• Freeman Distribution general tools
  see links page for details.