It’s time to do some vacuum molding. Theory is simple. Heat plastic using frame, slap it on top of mold with base perforated with holes to allow suction to pull plastic down.
That’s theory. In practice it means several try’s and fails. But eventually I found better settings. I was forced to order new sheets from stockist (5 large sheets in total (1.5×2.5m or something..), that means plenty of plastic). With smaller canopies it seems that 0.5mm stuff is optimal, but anything bigger really needs 0.75mm. I am using PET-G and APET sheets from local ETRA-shop. Which is really professional shop for all kinds of industrial stuff. I am using brands Vivak and NudePetG (funny…).
Anyway – now I have plenty of L-70 Vinka & PIK-16c Vasama canopies. Along with PIK-18 Sytky cowlings. Actually I have 3 vac boxes for different size molds. You might notice that biggest one needs double vacuums to do the trick. Actually that vac box is designed with oven size as an guide. It really is the biggest one which I can make without resorting to more exotic stuff.
Next step is to finetune PIK-15 Hinu (1.5m) canopy and cowling and do at least 4 sets of those. Also I need new batch of my really pro aileron covers.
