I'm looking at a longer spar (approximately 47 ft wingspan), so don't know whether your tooling would even work for me, but if you figure making maybe 5 sets and amortize the cost of the molds over that (around $300 per set) your labor and materials. I don't think anyone would fault you for making a buck -- time is money.
It doesn't sound like there would be a problem with the skins functionally -- cosmetically just tell everyone you did it on purpose!
--- In This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., Rick Mullins wrote:
>
> I made molds but they didn't come out quite as good as I hoped. But I tend to be a perfectionist and was looking for flawless. I made my molds by building the wings to the point where you would normally glue on the plywood, then I filled between the ribs with styrofoam then smoothed it all out with drywall joint compound. The problem was when the temperature changed the foam expanded at a different rate than the plywood so you can see where every rib was. It's really obvious when sighting down the inside of the shiny mold, but I'm thinking it won't be as much so with the finished product. When I get to the point where my wings are finished, I can see how they look, and have a chance to load test them, I might be willing to make D-tubes. I have $1600 and 3 months into molds. What would leading edges be worth?
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>
> ________________________________
> From: george_rf1 <george_rf1@...>
> To: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
> Sent: Thursday, July 28, 2011 4:01 PM
> Subject: [Carbondragonbuildersandpilots] Re: plywood properties
>
>
> Â
>
> It would be REALLY good if there were someone willing to make the carbon spar and Leading edge â€" that's something I would pay to have done.
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>
> That's very interesting , please do tell us, what would you expect to pay to hire someone to make the molds for leading edges and spars and the set of parts for you.
>
> George
