Can a vac-form pull be used as a mold for resin/fiberglass pulls?

[nick-a-tron]

Hi! Just been asked this by a friend but didnt have an answer for him so am asking here. He wants to make a few sets of USCM armour by creating a vacform set from his pep armour then using this pull as a negative to make fiberglass sets with a resin detail layer. Is this possible?

 

[Finhead]

Hi! Just been asked this by a friend but didnt have an answer for him so am asking here. He wants to make a few sets of USCM armour by creating a vacform set from his pep armour then using this pull as a negative to make fiberglass sets with a resin detail layer. Is this possible?

Unless he fills the pep work with filler or something solid the vac form will destroy the pep work. You would have to do the same for the vac formed parts.

 

[XRobots]

You need to make specific vacuum form moulds - with a flat bottom and no undercuts. It's possible you could use a Pep piece to base the mould on if you were making the moulds from scratch, but I can't see this really working for a whole finished suit.

Even if you could make vacuum form pulls from it, then it's not an ideal mould for fiberglass - you'd be better off with something flexible that you can peel off the finished part. I know that some people use rigid fiberglass moulds to make fiberglass pulls, but these are generally multi-part moulds so they can be taken off the finished piece easily.

On the whole you'd be better off with silicone/rubber moulds.

 

[nick-a-tron]

Thanks for the information guys, ill pass it on.

 

[PepMaster]

One thing you might also want to do is contact H1rgon, I believe he is on here, but if not he's on the 405th. Make sure it's alright with him to be producing "casts" or "pulls" from his unfolded files. It's one of the new rules in the 1st Post of the Pepakura Question thread on here. I worked with H1rgon to make the files, and it's perfectly fine with me, but you still make want to check with him. Some pepakura makers can be offended if not checked on it first.