I sent one of my parents Greenhouse Logos as a sticker however in sending via your link it will need to be trimmed to shape of logo or at least bottom White excess cut off.
Hello dear Matt, are you not concerned of the glass fiber being dangerous foor your health when doing layups? You seem to only be wearing a mask during cutting but not during the layup.
@@JonasE-l7q It is bits flying around that are bad/dangerous for lungs more so then in layup where epoxy is like using epoxy at home. Had he been able to use normal resin in his fiberglass, yes you want a mask on.
"we do not do these projects because they are less expensive but we do the because we aren't smart enough to know that they won't be less expensive" made me laugh lots.
"Send me a sticker and I WILL put it on the car. Any sticker. Doesn't matter what it is. As long as it fits flat in an envelope I will put it on the car no matter what". You sir, have massive balls... and an extremely offensive exhaust pipe. Great vid. Can't wait for more.
Matt a year ago: "I hate 3D printing" Matt now: "I 3D printed a funnel and vacuum adapter for my turbo so I could turbocharge my oven to make a windshield" I'm 100% certain that I love this mans content because he's as scatterbrained as I am.
The dad of my partner builds velomobiles as a hobby. He had exactly the same problems with his windshield. He solved it by not caring, since the fastest he will go is 15 kph.
Guys, he was born 1938 - he could go go faster than 15kph, but he won't for safety. And he buildt that thing entirely by himself for himself. With indicators, a little light and everything, ...
There is a nut on the underside of the dial that you can use to calibrate these thermometers. I also have a cheap one that needed some adjustment to be closer to accurate.
@@brendanmassaro9595 A chap I know takes a pack to the supermarket with him for when he gets bored. I donated some to the dispensing tech last time my daughter needed her glasses repaired. She reckoned she had some great places to stick them and considering some of the equipment in an opticians I fully believed her :)
he mentioned in the video that he'd need to make a giant oven to hold the mold, which would need a more powerful heat source, if he was to go that route.
I used to work with a company that did vacuum forming of poly carbonate. It helps the poly carbonate from what we saw to heat the mold as well. And trim excess material after it solidifys we would put square plastic blanks in with a frame to then move the mold into the plastic from underneath and vacuum it until it cools, but I am just a guy in the comment section, you are doing the awesome. Best wishes.
I used to work in a factory that made fighter jet canopies, and they made it look easy. You just pull a 4" thick sheet of plastic out of an oven the size of a house, and use a giant hydraulic machine to stretch it in several directions at the same time, and push it over the mold in one quick movement. Like many things, it's easy if you have all the right tools, and decades of experience.
@@robinbennett5994 There's probably a team of highly qualified employees (at least one PhD and couple masters in materials science of polymers) who had spent half a year figuring out the process. Leave hope behind who enters here, it's fractal problem solving all the way down.
I formed the windshields for my boat with a lawn weed burner. I practiced on some scrap until I figured how much heat it took to get it to bend without bringing the dreaded bubbles. With it laid on the old windshield I heated it slowly until it laid flat into all the compound curves. It came out great . Love your content
Oh Hell ya! if nothing else a lawn weed burner is fun as ph*ck to play with. FOOOSH of flame, ants die, weeds die, neighbors call the fire department ,,,
I hope this helps...having recently made curved windshields out of polycarbonate for an airplane windshield, I did it much differently and easier. Your "oven" doesn't need to be so hot, only 250f. Make it big enough for the whole form, which should withstand 250f. Preheat. Lay the entire sheet over the form and heat it for about 25 minutes. It should droop over the form. Do not remove it from the form until it is cooler than 175f. Use cotton gloves to push it to the form as it cools. Check on the progress every 5 minutes until you get good results. You may have to increase temp gradually depending on the thickness. If this helps, please sign "Bobby Tee 😊!" on you car with a sharpy! Test my procedure out by making a small mold and a 12" square piece of polycarbonate in your kitchen oven. You will have good results.
I hope he gives this a shot. Everything I read indicates the glass transition temperature to be about 300°F or higher. That said, I know you can also mechanically form polycarbonate with sheet metal techniques/tooling at room temperature, so I do have to wonder if some mechanical forming can be done below the GT temp to help it along.
I will send you a "Nett hier" sticker, which is a german meme sticker (that started as a promo thing by a southern state in germany) so that even in the middle of nowhere that one german tourist can look at your car and be like "wtf is that sticker doing here". Trust me, it's hilarious
Tourist stickers you say? How about from Australia. The extremely popular tourist marketing stickers for the Northern Territory read CUintheNT and the in the is very very small.
In an effort to show my displeasure with the YT overlords and their political sway on an open platform, I am making this comment as a gesture of solidarity with my brothers and sisters who have been demonized or banned. But not unlike my government issued personalized license plates that express my desire for the size of government to be reduced, I paid that very government extra money to have those license plates made, therefore feeding the beast I seek to starve. I believe this comment will trigger the algorithm to find both myself and this creator more desirable in the YT community, and thus, the snake eats its own tail.
I used to work at a robotics company where rapid prototyping was a daily event. This brought back a lot of memories of the trial and error periods we went through as we tested new methods and technologies. You mention this video was a "waste of time" but I can assure you, there is more value in this one video than in the other 99% of videos on youtube - combined! I now work for the MoD/DoD as a weapon systems engineer, and don't get hands on so much anymore, I drive a desk for a living. So it's always nice to see videos like these that remind me of the formative years of one's engineering journey. Kudos to you and the team for not only uploading your successes, but your lessons learned too. Far too many people devalue the importance of the journey and focus simply on the destination, whereas anyone who has ever been on a camping trip with mates knows that the journey is often the best part! Peace, my friend, from the other side of the world.
If the mold can be preheated, it could help with the draping. Ideally a ceramic mold that could be put in the oven with the windshield. This may require a larger oven, but you're clearly capable of any turbo charging that will be needed.
Since my beloved Husky always loved to go fast, I can't think of a better way to honor his attitude than to put his face on a racecar. Thanks for the opportunity, Matt.
Matt's stand-up for engineers nerds and makers is absolutely world-class, I'm not sure how well it would go down with an audience of 'normal people'. There is a risk they would not appreciate the full depth of the hilarity.
All of those thermometers are adjustable with a hex nut on the back of it. Just put all of the probes into ice water and after 10 minutes set all of them to 32°. Boom; fully calibrated.
Maybe not ice water for these *candy thermometers* whose scale reads as low as 100°F, eh? Boiling water @ 212°F @ sea level (apply correction factor for different elevations) is the cheapest calibration most of us have available.
I worked for a company making windshields for aircraft, developing forming processes for these. You need to vacuum bag the part to the mold to get it to take the shape. You may be able to get away with clamping the edges. I think lexan is polycarbonate. Try using acrylic instead. It’s a lot easier to work with. And you can sand and polish it when you’re done to get the small defects out. You can’t really sand polycarbonate because it’s too gummy. Let me know if I can help!
@@Mark_Bridges True, poly is less brittle than plain acrylic. Aircraft is typically stretched acrylic which makes it stronger and less prone to crazing.
The rules require polycarbonate because it is tougher. It is not brittle like acrylic, it will bend. You can literally bend 1/4" poly on a sheet metal break at room temperature. In industrial settings polycarbonate is the standard safety glass for this same reason. Lucky for me, aerodynamics are not a top priority when it comes to safety shields and containment guards, so only the occasional 2" radius bend would be required using a heater strip type thing.
I think you should try heating the lexan on the mold and let it form by gravity. That way it can release all internal tensions and it won't be wavy. Also the potentially grabby surface of the cloth probably doesn't help as it might partially stick as it droops. A+ for the oven tough.
How about enlarging the oven and having the molding process happen inside? I.e. place a cold, flat sheet onto mold (secured to the mold at the centerline), and have it slowly heat and drape over the mold, then slowly cool, all inside the oven. The slow heating, molding, and cooling process may help reduce the stress inside the sheet which happens during the very quick molding and cooling process, and therefore might help reduce the waviness and irregularities you're seeing.
I've made a lot of things using various types of plastic but mostly acrylic, plexiglass and polycarb and I found repeatable success with low temperatures, around 200-250 and don't let the plastic go completely soft, just when it starts to slump and have the warm mold ready (smooth wood is best). The fast cooling makes it wrinkle and the cooler side will pull the curve towards that side. Ideally the mold is in the oven for the whole ride. 15-20 min max. I got bubbles from too high temp and heating too quickly and not having support. Thicker is better to a point. Also possible is covering your mold with tin foil, clamped to make it smooth. The non-stick kind.
Hi Matt- water based polyurethane works well on fiberglass and won’t eat away the foam. I used to make canopies for model aeroplanes like this- exactly what you are doing now- only smaller.
I remember when I was a kid, my dad was building a fancy spiral staircase for a job. To form the hand rail, he made a long-ass steamer out of sewer pipe sections. Thing was like 50 feet long. No idea how he formed it into a perfect helix after that.
@@nicholaswouters1203 It's an American measurement. Long-Ass is the distance between you and the toilet when yours is on fire from eating gas station burritos .... 😉
Blender is great for flat patterns! The UV mapping tools will even visualize how much is each part of the pattern being stretched/squished when laid flat.
I did something similar to create a one-off male mold for a recumbent bicycle fairing. I had a vendor machine two polystyrene half shells ($2000 total), I lightly sanded the half shells, covered the polystyrene core in 2" wide polypropylene tape, sprayed on some mold release agent, and built-up two layers of carbon fiber with some extra epoxy coats for sanding and polishing. I then pulled off the polystyrene cores for each half and joined the two haves at the line of symmetry. Worked really well and would do it again. The only costly part was the very accurate polystyrene machining, but that was a huge labor saver and gave me 3D model perfect shape.
You are 100% right with moisture content. Polycarbonate absorbs a hell of a lot of moisture and gives it up very slowly. When I print with PC I dry for 3 days straight and get perfectly clear prints.
So I too am a designer. My design solution for your problem: ditch the complicated windscreen and make a digital periscope. You have very little to see for a very short time. Spending a lot of cash to un-see through wobbly plastic= bad plan.
@@rugwalle Doesn't matter if you lose steering power too, but why are they doing this at all if they only get to 160? Is that not scratch lambo territory?
@@davenordquist4663I don't know what speeds they acctualy reach. My comment was more about using unecessary complex solutions. Clear plastic has so many less things that can go wrong than a camera and a screen.
@@rugwalle Hot desert, shimmering air, heat of compressing air, thermoplastic can go wrong. The periscope notion isn't off much either; you don't want to stick out from the frame or have less than a square meter of optic to use, but speeding over the curvature of the earth from a POV 2.5 feet up is gonna surprise ya no matter how intrusive your headlights are (through an arc of earth.) Maybe get a satellite wingman as it were, maybe NOE radio, maybe just a nice psychommu amplifier or 200 like in Gundam 00. No humans (only, maybe the league requires it? Or; you can't call yourself Hi-Speed Siobhan if your parrot's name is Hank?)
Fifty years ago, we made an oven to take a 4 X 8 upright. It hung from binder clips on rollers and drapery track, which extended out 9' to move the sheet to the vacuum mold. The box was made from asbestos sheet and aluminum angle, but drywall and corner bead would probably work, or fiberglass/concrete board for higher temperatures. Not much insulation, but it didn't run much, so cost was low. The key to even heating was adding a squirrel cage blower, re-assembled with the motor outside. No problem with thin stock.
I wonder if you could effectively convert the mold into a vacuum forming mold by drilling enough holes in it and plugging in a shop vac. Maybe preheating the mold to some degree (electric mat heater on top) might help a little bit as well?
No time watching fast matt is wasted, even what looks like a failure, ends up to be a very good video to learn something Thank you Matt, always great videos
I did some windshields for ultralights airplaines and these are my thought on your experiment : 1 If you want a perfect optical quality, you need a PERFECT mould. It has to be a mirror finish, flat or high constant radiuses, no waves that you dont want to have in your windshield. So filler, sanding, iterate, 2kpaint, polishing. 2 Pre-heat the mould, but would be better with a thick fiberglas and remove the foam under (infrared heaters are the best for that). For this reason all mold in the industry are heated polished metal. I had nice success on polished stainless steel sheet wrapped on a wood pattern, but no conpound curve in this case. 3 You don't need coton cloth if your mould is mirror with heat resistant paint on it, anyway the cloth has built-in waves and pattern that you don't want in your windshield. 4 When forming you need a way to wrap the PC with a constant traction all along the border so pinch each side between 2 wooden slats with lots of screws to have a nice grab on each side. 5 You need to pull hard and quick. The mould has to be ANCHORED on a strong support. For this size I think you need 4 people, pull away to stretch the PC, then down to wrap when still pulling away, I think you where good on that. If your mould is preheated with still some infrared on it when forming, then you have more time to form before the PC solidify. 6 Polish the PC after to remove any defect (soft cotton wheel with a very gentle polishing conpound). You need some tests to master the technique, I did my training on small model airplane canopy when I was young [;oD
One of my favorite collection is my library of post-war plastic fabrication manuals. Lots of good tips for handwork in there. Here's one: to prevent mark-off, add a light coating of oil to the cloth. I'm in LA if you ever want to borrow.
Excellent. I need a friend like you that is smarter than me, but not so smart that he doesn't continue to fail at projects. All the while learning tons about what not to do. Keep it up Matt.
Hi Matt. I have drape formed Lexan for a small camper teardrop style. I made an aluminium former (singe curve) and a much bigger oven, plywood lined with rock-wool loft insulation, one which would hold the former as well as the Lexan. The curves were good but the small number of bubbles were infuriating as I didn't know about drying it out first. I bought spare oven parts and made my own heater fan assemblies. I made 3 ~3ft sq windows which needed three formers. good luck with the rest of the build.
@9:57 - If those thermometers have a hex-head on the bottom, they can be calibrated. We routinely calibrated out product thermometers for concessions health inspectors using iced water.
Someone probably already suggested it below, but setting the sheet on timber mould in the turbo oven plus help from gravity would do the work for you. It would require a bigger oven obviously. Good stuff 👍
@8:43- It makes perfect sense in the food service industry. Essentially you're creating something known as an impinger oven. Like the chain ovens in the back of your average Pizza Hut. Forced hot air impinging upon the food for a very fast cook time.
ive seen it done with sheet metal molds or wood covered in body filler molds. They build the oven big enough to put the mold in the oven with the glass, let it heat up and the poly will drape down over the mold. if you use a wood mold it needs to be pre baked to remove moisture.
Most kitchen thermometers are adjustable. On the bottom of the disk, you’ll see a nut, put a small wrench on the nut, and you can spin the disk. Put the thermometer in boiling water (212°), and adjust to that known temperature.
I was thinking parchment paper in place of the green cotton. Also same the windshield mold perfectly smooth. However you've done a great job. I enjoy figuring out how over just buying too. 👍
Commercially Lexan for moulding is heated by “ infra red “ heaters. Usually it’s a series of these arranged to heat the sheet without an oven . Also the edges of the lexan shett are held in a frame and then the whole thing is drawn down over the buck. Hope this makes sense and helps.
Matt, you're a legend you don't care about making a mistake and on putting yourself out there on RUclips. A lot of people are scared of mistakes and being judged by judgy people I live in England. We're making mistakes all the time. Woohoo!
we did this at highschool. the lexan needs to be on a frame. under tension so it stretches over the form. we shoved the whole mould in the oven, let it sag, pulled it out then quickly clamped the frame down. otherwise it does this, goes lumpy.
Pool Table felt is the hack for the mold. Also carry the polycarb out of the oven on top of another sheet of felt and slide it onto the mold, then use the hot felt to hold the polycarb down. Used, quality pool table felt is fine. Just dry the beer out first. This'll get you 80%. If it gets goosed, put it back in the oven! It will flatten out and you can have another crack. Don't bother with a heatgun, it'll lens straight away. If you can make a rack to get the polycab off the oven floor and allow full circulation, it'll help your result. A thin steel sheet full of small holes does the trick. If you actually want to make a perfect windshield, make your mold out of 1.2mm aluminum sheet pulled over some ribs so you can have the whole mold (with pool table felt) inside your oven (English wheel may be required, but any way you can make a mold that'll take the heat will work gravy.). Bake out the moisture flat as you did, then pop it on the mold and heat it up for 30 mins at 185c(temp may vary but less is best to let it drape), turn off the heat, leave the turbo running and let it all cool down together. Best if you have space in your oven to have the mold in while you're baking out the moisture, it'll dry out the felt and preheat the mold too. As someone who does this professionally, I'm impressed (but not surprised) you got so close on a first attempt. That was most of the way there, would have worked with acrylic. Also, my oven really needs a turbo now.
did the same with 10 ft long oven built from foil backed foam board, but blew mine with air through shaped aperture, came out perfect first time. Screen was about 4 times the size of yours
Hi there, I have some experience on this. If possible, put the mold below the heated box and make the bottom sway out of the bottom, also, suspend the sheet of PC in a frame which hangs from ropes that you can lower and control from the top on the outside of the box. This way you can simply lower the sheet onto the mold and continue to heat from the sheet a bit so the top does not cool as quickly, moreover: pre-heat the mold slightly, this prevents most of the funky-house-effect and give you some more time to adjust things if necessary. If the mold and the lowering-process of the sheed are well aligned, the forming process is done quickly and allows the sheet to cool while being well above Tg (glass-transition temperature) all the way to below the Tg, giving you the most optimal finish. Hope this helps, goodluck!
Walking around in white coveralls with black gloves is the garage. Your neighbor must be thinking about things and then rethinking it again the next day when you put in the garden 😂
I talked to a man that made glider canopies, they have a cutout of the base shape and clamp the plastic sheet to it and blow the shape in the oven using compressed air. He said the hardest part wad unbolting all the 50 or so bolts before the air/ plastic cooled and sucked the plastic back in! They had 6 people around the "mold" undoing bolts as fast as they could.
Also, DUDE those vacuums totally suck! I've had one for years as my car/shop vac and it never stops sucking - no matter how much metal dust and other unreasonable crap I throw at it. It's nearly unbelievable that they are still so cheap.
im just about to do the same and drape form screens for my car prject using an oven and steel box......apart from making me relise how hard it may be..i think sir your humour is briliant,your vids are a treat to watch every single one of them..keep it going matt...from a UK fan
Hey Matt, Look at how mechanical thermoforming works. Calrod heating elements are snaked above and below the plastic a few inches away but covering the whole surface to be formed top and bottom. Material to be formed is clamped on 4 sides in a metal picture frame. Measure plastic heat by contact, with handheld IR, or just by eye looking for sag. when on temp quickly pull the frame and plastic from between the heaters and pull down over the mold. Ideally this is when you would apply vacuum, but your shape doesn't really need it. I'm not seeing any good videos here but will post as reply if I find one.
I think it would help to use a lint roller or do a masking tape clean-up job on the fabric first. Since flocked fabrics are typically made by gluing tiny particles to a base fabric, the fibers that don't get glued down well can get pulled off during handling or literally anything sticky touching them. You'd probably need to do a couple rounds to be thorough. Running a vacuum over it might also help with some of the fibers.
Go to ground.news/superfastmatt to compare news coverage and spot media bias. Subscribe through my link for 40% off unlimited access this month.
Paying for news? Bwhahah. Hah. Lol no.
I sent one of my parents Greenhouse Logos as a sticker however in sending via your link it will need to be trimmed to shape of logo or at least bottom White excess cut off.
Hello dear Matt, are you not concerned of the glass fiber being dangerous foor your health when doing layups? You seem to only be wearing a mask during cutting but not during the layup.
@@JonasE-l7q It is bits flying around that are bad/dangerous for lungs more so then in layup where epoxy is like using epoxy at home. Had he been able to use normal resin in his fiberglass, yes you want a mask on.
I wonder how many people use this to GET biased news and stay in the echo chamber haha
You didn't fail to make a windshield, you just made a protective travel cover for a windshield.
By my calculation, that sounds like a failure to make a windshield. No?
@@savage6394No, no. The protective travel cover still does shield from the wind along with other things. So technically it is a windshield.
@@edwardscott3262 Ah, a windshieldwindshield
Storm window for windshield if you will
Plus an extra.
"we do not do these projects because they are less expensive but we do the because we aren't smart enough to know that they won't be less expensive" made me laugh lots.
The mantra of my life lmao
As Kennedy said: "We chose to go to the moon and do these other things not because they are easy... but because we thought they would be easy".
.
Yeah that's over 50% of my projects. But not 100%! YAY!
Still trying to learn this.
"Send me a sticker and I WILL put it on the car. Any sticker. Doesn't matter what it is. As long as it fits flat in an envelope I will put it on the car no matter what". You sir, have massive balls... and an extremely offensive exhaust pipe.
Great vid. Can't wait for more.
Love a good stickerbomb lol, I'm definitely going to send some.
wouldn't be surprised if the exhaust pipe ends up being 4 kg heavier with half of the stickers send soon...
If it doesn't end up with goatse hands on either side of the exhaust I'm going to be sad. And pretty surprised.
get to top comment
Shit, I make stickers. I'm sending something unhinged but not demonetization worthy.
Matt a year ago: "I hate 3D printing"
Matt now: "I 3D printed a funnel and vacuum adapter for my turbo so I could turbocharge my oven to make a windshield"
I'm 100% certain that I love this mans content because he's as scatterbrained as I am.
It can be a pain to get working right tbf
3D printing got very easy and this is the perfect type of thing to 3D print so I'm not surprised, I love functional 3D printing personally lol
3D printing basically went from horse and buggy to the Model T recently. It's a whole new level of technology that is so much easier to get going.
you should get checked for ADHD :)
"The real windshield is the friends whose time we wasted along the way" hit hard. Tears in my eyes. Bless you, SuperfastMatt. Bless you.
Agreed, it hit me right in the feels.
Humor, sharp irony, and then occasionally something profound. Wow!
The dad of my partner builds velomobiles as a hobby. He had exactly the same problems with his windshield. He solved it by not caring, since the fastest he will go is 15 kph.
... which is awfully slow for a VM? 🤔
20 km/h is painfully slow for me, I can't comprehend who would drive a velomobile at 15 tops. Is it exclusively for the elderly?
Velos reach speeds of 60kmh
Guys, he was born 1938 - he could go go faster than 15kph, but he won't for safety. And he buildt that thing entirely by himself for himself. With indicators, a little light and everything, ...
@@christofschwarz6602 In that context 15kph sounds almost race car like
There is a nut on the underside of the dial that you can use to calibrate these thermometers. I also have a cheap one that needed some adjustment to be closer to accurate.
Upvoted so Matt sees it.
TIL, That will be useful knowledge.
Yup, came here to say that...
Some of the ones that come with a protector sleeve even have a tool formed in to tweak said nut.
Indeed @@Mark_Bridges
It definitely needs a 'For rectal use only' sticker'
preferably on the outside of the exhaust pipe
@@engineer_cat Ooh, that could be a bit, erm, toasty! 🤣
Someone put one of those on a ball in our ball pit at work that are shaped like giant sprinkles. It made my day
@@brendanmassaro9595 A chap I know takes a pack to the supermarket with him for when he gets bored. I donated some to the dispensing tech last time my daughter needed her glasses repaired. She reckoned she had some great places to stick them and considering some of the equipment in an opticians I fully believed her :)
A fishtank discovery series put the mould in the oven too. It draped over the mould as it softened. They were using inch thick polycarbonate, too.
That what I was thinking, make a bigger turbo-charged oven and put the mould together with the sheet
It also allows for a cooling ramp down, and no need to touch it until fully hard. (Insert obligatory "that's what she said" comment here. )
Thinking this also.
@@owensparks5013
Okay.
That's what she said.
Happy to oblige.
he mentioned in the video that he'd need to make a giant oven to hold the mold, which would need a more powerful heat source, if he was to go that route.
I used to work with a company that did vacuum forming of poly carbonate. It helps the poly carbonate from what we saw to heat the mold as well. And trim excess material after it solidifys we would put square plastic blanks in with a frame to then move the mold into the plastic from underneath and vacuum it until it cools, but I am just a guy in the comment section, you are doing the awesome. Best wishes.
I used to work in a factory that made fighter jet canopies, and they made it look easy. You just pull a 4" thick sheet of plastic out of an oven the size of a house, and use a giant hydraulic machine to stretch it in several directions at the same time, and push it over the mold in one quick movement. Like many things, it's easy if you have all the right tools, and decades of experience.
@@robinbennett5994 There's probably a team of highly qualified employees (at least one PhD and couple masters in materials science of polymers) who had spent half a year figuring out the process. Leave hope behind who enters here, it's fractal problem solving all the way down.
And money for giant press
I formed the windshields for my boat with a lawn weed burner. I practiced on some scrap until I figured how much heat it took to get it to bend without bringing the dreaded bubbles. With it laid on the old windshield I heated it slowly until it laid flat into all the compound curves. It came out great . Love your content
Oh Hell ya! if nothing else a lawn weed burner is fun as ph*ck to play with. FOOOSH of flame, ants die, weeds die, neighbors call the fire department ,,,
I hope this helps...having recently made curved windshields out of polycarbonate for an airplane windshield, I did it much differently and easier. Your "oven" doesn't need to be so hot, only 250f. Make it big enough for the whole form, which should withstand 250f. Preheat. Lay the entire sheet over the form and heat it for about 25 minutes. It should droop over the form. Do not remove it from the form until it is cooler than 175f. Use cotton gloves to push it to the form as it cools. Check on the progress every 5 minutes until you get good results. You may have to increase temp gradually depending on the thickness. If this helps, please sign "Bobby Tee 😊!" on you car with a sharpy! Test my procedure out by making a small mold and a 12" square piece of polycarbonate in your kitchen oven. You will have good results.
I hope he gives this a shot.
Everything I read indicates the glass transition temperature to be about 300°F or higher.
That said, I know you can also mechanically form polycarbonate with sheet metal techniques/tooling at room temperature, so I do have to wonder if some mechanical forming can be done below the GT temp to help it along.
I will send you a "Nett hier" sticker, which is a german meme sticker (that started as a promo thing by a southern state in germany) so that even in the middle of nowhere that one german tourist can look at your car and be like "wtf is that sticker doing here". Trust me, it's hilarious
Probably also needs a Nordschleife or Bitte ein Bit stickers. Gotta hit all the German memes.
Aber waren Sie schon einmal in Baden-Württemberg?
I had the same idea, mine is already on the way😂 But more equals better.
Peak German humor right here
Tourist stickers you say? How about from Australia. The extremely popular tourist marketing stickers for the Northern Territory read CUintheNT and the in the is very very small.
Tactical interaction for our YT overlords
The algorithm can fly fighter jets now huh.
Engaging reply, to appease the overlords
Same, ahta
In an effort to show my displeasure with the YT overlords and their political sway on an open platform, I am making this comment as a gesture of solidarity with my brothers and sisters who have been demonized or banned.
But not unlike my government issued personalized license plates that express my desire for the size of government to be reduced, I paid that very government extra money to have those license plates made, therefore feeding the beast I seek to starve. I believe this comment will trigger the algorithm to find both myself and this creator more desirable in the YT community, and thus, the snake eats its own tail.
This is where my comment belongs
An easily missable gem is the type of stickers and their locations. I had to pause and zoom in on them for this laughter.
I used to work at a robotics company where rapid prototyping was a daily event. This brought back a lot of memories of the trial and error periods we went through as we tested new methods and technologies. You mention this video was a "waste of time" but I can assure you, there is more value in this one video than in the other 99% of videos on youtube - combined!
I now work for the MoD/DoD as a weapon systems engineer, and don't get hands on so much anymore, I drive a desk for a living. So it's always nice to see videos like these that remind me of the formative years of one's engineering journey. Kudos to you and the team for not only uploading your successes, but your lessons learned too. Far too many people devalue the importance of the journey and focus simply on the destination, whereas anyone who has ever been on a camping trip with mates knows that the journey is often the best part!
Peace, my friend, from the other side of the world.
The correct fix is to run no windsheild. Use small cameras with a live video feed to VR goggles.
Nothing works as good as human eyes, nothing.
Killdozer has entered the chat
@@Odins-Dadand now it’s just broken down
And make sure to use the cheapest possible cameras and goggles off wish
This is the approach Lockheed’s X-59 super sonic aircraft is using.
If the mold can be preheated, it could help with the draping. Ideally a ceramic mold that could be put in the oven with the windshield. This may require a larger oven, but you're clearly capable of any turbo charging that will be needed.
Since my beloved Husky always loved to go fast, I can't think of a better way to honor his attitude than to put his face on a racecar. Thanks for the opportunity, Matt.
Will that turn it into Matt's facecar?
how you still dont have your own comedy show is beyond me! my newest favorite channel if i feel i need a good sarcasm induced chuckle.
He does. This is that show.
UPDATE: 8 minutes in the video and i am rolling in stitches here! 🤣 😂
Matt's stand-up for engineers nerds and makers is absolutely world-class, I'm not sure how well it would go down with an audience of 'normal people'. There is a risk they would not appreciate the full depth of the hilarity.
@@xxwookey lets be honest 90% of the numbties wouldnt get it anyway. but that makes it for us "more normal" people even funnier i guess?
All of those thermometers are adjustable with a hex nut on the back of it. Just put all of the probes into ice water and after 10 minutes set all of them to 32°.
Boom; fully calibrated.
Maybe not ice water for these *candy thermometers* whose scale reads as low as 100°F, eh?
Boiling water @ 212°F @ sea level (apply correction factor for different elevations) is the cheapest calibration most of us have available.
I’m totally sending you a VORON sticker. It will be my honor to have it on this creation.
what a voron
@@Kalimerakisits almost like google doesnt exist
hehe my printer go nyoom nyoom vrrbrbrbrbr nyoom
@@SlidewaysMotionI wish mine did to 😢😢😢😢😢😢😢😢😢
This definitely deserves a VORON sticker
I worked for a company making windshields for aircraft, developing forming processes for these. You need to vacuum bag the part to the mold to get it to take the shape. You may be able to get away with clamping the edges.
I think lexan is polycarbonate. Try using acrylic instead. It’s a lot easier to work with. And you can sand and polish it when you’re done to get the small defects out. You can’t really sand polycarbonate because it’s too gummy.
Let me know if I can help!
Isn't polycarbonate stronger than acrylic? I thought he said he needed the strong stuff because of rules to run on the salt flats.
@@Mark_Bridges True, poly is less brittle than plain acrylic. Aircraft is typically stretched acrylic which makes it stronger and less prone to crazing.
The rules require polycarbonate because it is tougher. It is not brittle like acrylic, it will bend. You can literally bend 1/4" poly on a sheet metal break at room temperature. In industrial settings polycarbonate is the standard safety glass for this same reason. Lucky for me, aerodynamics are not a top priority when it comes to safety shields and containment guards, so only the occasional 2" radius bend would be required using a heater strip type thing.
I think you should try heating the lexan on the mold and let it form by gravity.
That way it can release all internal tensions and it won't be wavy.
Also the potentially grabby surface of the cloth probably doesn't help as it might partially stick as it droops.
A+ for the oven tough.
He'd need an even bigger oven :D
@@MumrikDK And he would need a different mould... not made of polystyrene foam.
@@brianb-p6586 it might be possible to separate the fiberglass from the foam and use that.
@@MumrikDK and a bigger turbo-charger.
I like ALL of the above ideas, but I'd use a decent turbocharger driven Burn Barrel to make the hot air.
That guide is the best lolol. “Literally inside the exhaust”!
How about enlarging the oven and having the molding process happen inside? I.e. place a cold, flat sheet onto mold (secured to the mold at the centerline), and have it slowly heat and drape over the mold, then slowly cool, all inside the oven.
The slow heating, molding, and cooling process may help reduce the stress inside the sheet which happens during the very quick molding and cooling process, and therefore might help reduce the waviness and irregularities you're seeing.
Matt’s videos genuinely make my day better
I love these videos. As a controls Engineer and an automotive enthusiast the content is just perfect.
I'll never make my own windshield, but for some reason, I now want to. Great stuff as always.
Thanks!
Good News Matt, the algorithm worked, 1st suggestion.. well done indeed
Thanks
3:40 for use in racecars 🤣
I've made a lot of things using various types of plastic but mostly acrylic, plexiglass and polycarb and I found repeatable success with low temperatures, around 200-250 and don't let the plastic go completely soft, just when it starts to slump and have the warm mold ready (smooth wood is best). The fast cooling makes it wrinkle and the cooler side will pull the curve towards that side. Ideally the mold is in the oven for the whole ride. 15-20 min max. I got bubbles from too high temp and heating too quickly and not having support. Thicker is better to a point. Also possible is covering your mold with tin foil, clamped to make it smooth. The non-stick kind.
I love the sticker plan
Hi Matt- water based polyurethane works well on fiberglass and won’t eat away the foam. I used to make canopies for model aeroplanes like this- exactly what you are doing now- only smaller.
I remember when I was a kid, my dad was building a fancy spiral staircase for a job. To form the hand rail, he made a long-ass steamer out of sewer pipe sections. Thing was like 50 feet long. No idea how he formed it into a perfect helix after that.
Not sure what an ass steamer is, or why it would need to be that long 🤔
@@nicholaswouters1203 Depends how long your ass is I guess?
@@nicholaswouters1203 It's an American measurement. Long-Ass is the distance between you and the toilet when yours is on fire from eating gas station burritos .... 😉
The only channel I don't skip through the ads. It is a great day when SFM posts.
ex-GE oven for ex-GE lexan, perfect combo
Blender is great for flat patterns! The UV mapping tools will even visualize how much is each part of the pattern being stretched/squished when laid flat.
Future Matt is going to turbo the sander to smooth out some wobbly lexan!
I did something similar to create a one-off male mold for a recumbent bicycle fairing. I had a vendor machine two polystyrene half shells ($2000 total), I lightly sanded the half shells, covered the polystyrene core in 2" wide polypropylene tape, sprayed on some mold release agent, and built-up two layers of carbon fiber with some extra epoxy coats for sanding and polishing. I then pulled off the polystyrene cores for each half and joined the two haves at the line of symmetry. Worked really well and would do it again. The only costly part was the very accurate polystyrene machining, but that was a huge labor saver and gave me 3D model perfect shape.
i am going to continue to allow you to prove all of these concepts for me.
thanks for saving me so much time!
You are 100% right with moisture content. Polycarbonate absorbs a hell of a lot of moisture and gives it up very slowly. When I print with PC I dry for 3 days straight and get perfectly clear prints.
So I too am a designer. My design solution for your problem: ditch the complicated windscreen and make a digital periscope.
You have very little to see for a very short time. Spending a lot of cash to un-see through wobbly plastic= bad plan.
neat idea, not sure how allowed it is.
Good idea until you loose power at 160mph
@@rugwalle Doesn't matter if you lose steering power too, but why are they doing this at all if they only get to 160? Is that not scratch lambo territory?
@@davenordquist4663I don't know what speeds they acctualy reach. My comment was more about using unecessary complex solutions. Clear plastic has so many less things that can go wrong than a camera and a screen.
@@rugwalle Hot desert, shimmering air, heat of compressing air, thermoplastic can go wrong. The periscope notion isn't off much either; you don't want to stick out from the frame or have less than a square meter of optic to use, but speeding over the curvature of the earth from a POV 2.5 feet up is gonna surprise ya no matter how intrusive your headlights are (through an arc of earth.) Maybe get a satellite wingman as it were, maybe NOE radio, maybe just a nice psychommu amplifier or 200 like in Gundam 00. No humans (only, maybe the league requires it? Or; you can't call yourself Hi-Speed Siobhan if your parrot's name is Hank?)
Fifty years ago, we made an oven to take a 4 X 8 upright. It hung from binder clips on rollers and drapery track, which extended out 9' to move the sheet to the vacuum mold. The box was made from asbestos sheet and aluminum angle, but drywall and corner bead would probably work, or fiberglass/concrete board for higher temperatures. Not much insulation, but it didn't run much, so cost was low. The key to even heating was adding a squirrel cage blower, re-assembled with the motor outside. No problem with thin stock.
I wonder if you could effectively convert the mold into a vacuum forming mold by drilling enough holes in it and plugging in a shop vac. Maybe preheating the mold to some degree (electric mat heater on top) might help a little bit as well?
No time watching fast matt is wasted, even what looks like a failure, ends up to be a very good video to learn something
Thank you Matt, always great videos
5:24
Flocked rubber?
what kink is that used in???
I did some windshields for ultralights airplaines and these are my thought on your experiment : 1 If you want a perfect optical quality, you need a PERFECT mould. It has to be a mirror finish, flat or high constant radiuses, no waves that you dont want to have in your windshield. So filler, sanding, iterate, 2kpaint, polishing. 2 Pre-heat the mould, but would be better with a thick fiberglas and remove the foam under (infrared heaters are the best for that). For this reason all mold in the industry are heated polished metal. I had nice success on polished stainless steel sheet wrapped on a wood pattern, but no conpound curve in this case. 3 You don't need coton cloth if your mould is mirror with heat resistant paint on it, anyway the cloth has built-in waves and pattern that you don't want in your windshield. 4 When forming you need a way to wrap the PC with a constant traction all along the border so pinch each side between 2 wooden slats with lots of screws to have a nice grab on each side. 5 You need to pull hard and quick. The mould has to be ANCHORED on a strong support. For this size I think you need 4 people, pull away to stretch the PC, then down to wrap when still pulling away, I think you where good on that. If your mould is preheated with still some infrared on it when forming, then you have more time to form before the PC solidify. 6 Polish the PC after to remove any defect (soft cotton wheel with a very gentle polishing conpound). You need some tests to master the technique, I did my training on small model airplane canopy when I was young [;oD
One of my favorite collection is my library of post-war plastic fabrication manuals. Lots of good tips for handwork in there. Here's one: to prevent mark-off, add a light coating of oil to the cloth. I'm in LA if you ever want to borrow.
"We do them because we are not smart enough to know that they won't be less expensive."
Excellent. I need a friend like you that is smarter than me, but not so smart that he doesn't continue to fail at projects. All the while learning tons about what not to do. Keep it up Matt.
I really liked the proper racing-grade foam board. ❤ Some morons use homebuilding stuff.
That oven blends seamlessly into the garden. Good to see you're doing something my wife's been telling me to do for years...working on your body.
Hi Matt. I have drape formed Lexan for a small camper teardrop style. I made an aluminium former (singe curve) and a much bigger oven, plywood lined with rock-wool loft insulation, one which would hold the former as well as the Lexan. The curves were good but the small number of bubbles were infuriating as I didn't know about drying it out first. I bought spare oven parts and made my own heater fan assemblies. I made 3 ~3ft sq windows which needed three formers. good luck with the rest of the build.
@9:57 - If those thermometers have a hex-head on the bottom, they can be calibrated. We routinely calibrated out product thermometers for concessions health inspectors using iced water.
Someone probably already suggested it below, but setting the sheet on timber mould in the turbo oven plus help from gravity would do the work for you. It would require a bigger oven obviously.
Good stuff 👍
Use cast acrylic to make your windshield. I blew a bubble winshield for my homebuilt aircraft using it and it worked great! Good luck.
acrylic isn't generally legal in motorsport
@8:43- It makes perfect sense in the food service industry. Essentially you're creating something known as an impinger oven. Like the chain ovens in the back of your average Pizza Hut. Forced hot air impinging upon the food for a very fast cook time.
I appreciate this channels approach to engineering so much.
I had to rewind and pause and I have tears in my eyes over "Literally inside the exhaust pipe".
Best YT channel about turboed ovens !!!
Epic. Actually similar to the turboven I’d been brainstorming, so 15 minutes well spent. Sticker’s in the mail. Keep up the great work.
This quote best sums up your projects: "We did not do this because it was easy. We did it because we thought it would be easy."
You sir are one of the few real engineers on youtube. One has to be one to appreciate your shenanigans..
i love watching all of SuperhotovenMatt's videos
This will get out of hand very quickly. Can’t wait to see the progress, keep up the amazing work!
ive seen it done with sheet metal molds or wood covered in body filler molds. They build the oven big enough to put the mold in the oven with the glass, let it heat up and the poly will drape down over the mold. if you use a wood mold it needs to be pre baked to remove moisture.
I binged all your videos in the past month. This new fan just subbed, and is commenting for the algorithm. Neat.
Most kitchen thermometers are adjustable. On the bottom of the disk, you’ll see a nut, put a small wrench on the nut, and you can spin the disk. Put the thermometer in boiling water (212°), and adjust to that known temperature.
I come here not to learn things but to enjoy your humor. The learning of things is a bonus.
For light aircraft we use plexiglass and felt for it to sit on whilst heating.. Another piece of felt to pull the windshield around the mold..
I was thinking parchment paper in place of the green cotton. Also same the windshield mold perfectly smooth. However you've done a great job. I enjoy figuring out how over just buying too. 👍
Commercially Lexan for moulding is heated by “ infra red “ heaters. Usually it’s a series of these arranged to heat the sheet without an oven . Also the edges of the lexan shett are held in a frame and then the whole thing is drawn down over the buck. Hope this makes sense and helps.
Your parting words have inspired me to finish my $15k+ adjustable desk
you are soo good at what youre doing and i admire that😃
Matt, you're a legend you don't care about making a mistake and on putting yourself out there on RUclips. A lot of people are scared of mistakes and being judged by judgy people I live in England. We're making mistakes all the time. Woohoo!
You got me cracking up in the break room at work. Your videos never fail to disappoint.
A turbo charged oven, such ingenuity! Love your dry sense of humor as well.
we did this at highschool.
the lexan needs to be on a frame. under tension so it stretches over the form.
we shoved the whole mould in the oven, let it sag, pulled it out then quickly clamped the frame down.
otherwise it does this, goes lumpy.
Matt the only channel that makes me laugh outloud thank you
Pool Table felt is the hack for the mold. Also carry the polycarb out of the oven on top of another sheet of felt and slide it onto the mold, then use the hot felt to hold the polycarb down. Used, quality pool table felt is fine. Just dry the beer out first. This'll get you 80%. If it gets goosed, put it back in the oven! It will flatten out and you can have another crack. Don't bother with a heatgun, it'll lens straight away. If you can make a rack to get the polycab off the oven floor and allow full circulation, it'll help your result. A thin steel sheet full of small holes does the trick.
If you actually want to make a perfect windshield, make your mold out of 1.2mm aluminum sheet pulled over some ribs so you can have the whole mold (with pool table felt) inside your oven (English wheel may be required, but any way you can make a mold that'll take the heat will work gravy.). Bake out the moisture flat as you did, then pop it on the mold and heat it up for 30 mins at 185c(temp may vary but less is best to let it drape), turn off the heat, leave the turbo running and let it all cool down together. Best if you have space in your oven to have the mold in while you're baking out the moisture, it'll dry out the felt and preheat the mold too.
As someone who does this professionally, I'm impressed (but not surprised) you got so close on a first attempt. That was most of the way there, would have worked with acrylic. Also, my oven really needs a turbo now.
did the same with 10 ft long oven built from foil backed foam board, but blew mine with air through shaped aperture, came out perfect first time. Screen was about 4 times the size of yours
Matt’s videos are always entertaining and this one didn’t disappoint. Love your work, Matt 👍
Hi there, I have some experience on this. If possible, put the mold below the heated box and make the bottom sway out of the bottom, also, suspend the sheet of PC in a frame which hangs from ropes that you can lower and control from the top on the outside of the box. This way you can simply lower the sheet onto the mold and continue to heat from the sheet a bit so the top does not cool as quickly, moreover: pre-heat the mold slightly, this prevents most of the funky-house-effect and give you some more time to adjust things if necessary. If the mold and the lowering-process of the sheed are well aligned, the forming process is done quickly and allows the sheet to cool while being well above Tg (glass-transition temperature) all the way to below the Tg, giving you the most optimal finish. Hope this helps, goodluck!
@11:46 still rocking that 70s all brown look
I love your videos. Painfully honest and constantly brilliant
I love the humorous way of yours to transport the rollercoaster of triumphs and failures!
Walking around in white coveralls with black gloves is the garage.
Your neighbor must be thinking about things and then rethinking it again the next day when you put in the garden 😂
I talked to a man that made glider canopies, they have a cutout of the base shape and clamp the plastic sheet to it and blow the shape in the oven using compressed air. He said the hardest part wad unbolting all the 50 or so bolts before the air/ plastic cooled and sucked the plastic back in! They had 6 people around the "mold" undoing bolts as fast as they could.
Worked for Tesla. Lives in Southern California. Doesn’t eat base media bile for breakfast.
I think I like this guy.
Also, DUDE those vacuums totally suck! I've had one for years as my car/shop vac and it never stops sucking - no matter how much metal dust and other unreasonable crap I throw at it. It's nearly unbelievable that they are still so cheap.
You are always entertaining, sometimes I even learn something. I learned about ground news last time. Thanks for bringing us along.
Matt, Because of you I spend 43,215% more time laughing !! Big thanks! I like your humor so much!!
"i accept bribes!" That is a excellent quote! Please keep up the wonderful work!
im just about to do the same and drape form screens for my car prject using an oven and steel box......apart from making me relise how hard it may be..i think sir your humour is briliant,your vids are a treat to watch every single one of them..keep it going matt...from a UK fan
Hey Matt, Look at how mechanical thermoforming works. Calrod heating elements are snaked above and below the plastic a few inches away but covering the whole surface to be formed top and bottom. Material to be formed is clamped on 4 sides in a metal picture frame. Measure plastic heat by contact, with handheld IR, or just by eye looking for sag. when on temp quickly pull the frame and plastic from between the heaters and pull down over the mold. Ideally this is when you would apply vacuum, but your shape doesn't really need it. I'm not seeing any good videos here but will post as reply if I find one.
It makes me smile that the exhaust pipe sticker options are in the exact place they belong. Great vid as usual.
I think it would help to use a lint roller or do a masking tape clean-up job on the fabric first. Since flocked fabrics are typically made by gluing tiny particles to a base fabric, the fibers that don't get glued down well can get pulled off during handling or literally anything sticky touching them. You'd probably need to do a couple rounds to be thorough. Running a vacuum over it might also help with some of the fibers.