Stabilizing Set up help

I

IrishSteel

Joined
Nov 12, 2012
Messages
88
Hello all,

I recently inherited a .5hp 5cfm vacuum pump that I would like to use for some home stabilizing. I have a hose to go with it and I can make a small chamber out of pickle jar easy enough but I'm wondering if there's anything I need to put in line with the hose to prevent stabilizing fluid from condensing in the pump. My worry is having the chamber hooked directly to the pump will let stabilizer evaporate into the hose/pump. Anything I should use to prevent this?
 
I have seen where a few guys have made a catch jar, which is simply a 2nd glass jar between the pump and the vacuum chamber, never seen anything about vapors though
 
Irish, I have a steel pressure cylinder w/ pressure and vacuum gauges attached i'll give ya if you'll pay shipping and do some stabilizing for me. I made it when I thought of starting a stabilizing service of my own. The pickle jar will die a horrible messy death the first time you pressure up on it. My email is in my profile, if you have a problem getting it post back here on yer topic and we'll hook up somehow.
 
IrishSteel said:
Hello all,

I recently inherited a .5hp 5cfm vacuum pump that I would like to use for some home stabilizing. I have a hose to go with it and I can make a small chamber out of pickle jar easy enough but I'm wondering if there's anything I need to put in line with the hose to prevent stabilizing fluid from condensing in the pump. My worry is having the chamber hooked directly to the pump will let stabilizer evaporate into the hose/pump.

Anything I should use to prevent this?
Click to expand...

Send it out for best results

http://www.kandgstabilizing.com/


http://www.stabilizedwood.com/




Using a glass jar in that way, it's possible you can implode the jar when it fails = glass splinters in the face
 
The catch jar is exactly what I need. Thank you, John, for pointing me in the right direction!

Bootstrap I left you a visitor message; couldn't find your email.

Count, I agree that the best results will come from sending it out but where's the fun in that :D. I also agree that glass jars are not something I want to use in the long run.
 
If you are set on doing it yourself, contact Curtis at Turntex. He has stabilizing resin and chambers. But even if you don't buy anything from him he is very generous with information. He'll help you get set up and guide you as far as the components you need as well as what will work and what won't.

https://www.turntex.com
 
I bought a stainless steel food canister with a clear air tight lid. First thing I did was to remove the lid and replace it with a piece of 3/8 lexan. I used 3/4 inch neoprene weather stripping from Home Depot for the seal. Works great. I did all this after the jar I was using imploded. Wow that had fluid all over the shop. The other thing I did was to put an inline catch cup between the chamber and pump. It is the cup from a cheep break bleeding set from HF. Comes with hose cup and fittings.
 
Please contact Mark at Burl Source and talk to him before going any farther. He has first hand experience on this subject. Doing your own home stabilizing is a bad idea.
 
buckaroo2219 said:
I did all this after the jar I was using imploded
Click to expand...

If your going to use glass then use a Mason/Kerr canning jar they are designed to hold up under pressure they can go from 240 degrees and tremendous pressure to a near perfect vacuum in the head space at room temperature, when I pull canned venison out of the pressure cooker they are still boiling while setting on the counter top, having said that, it is still a better idea to get a paint pot from HF

Its not always about the destination, sometimes its all about the ride ;0)
 
"Where's the fun in that," he says. I guess picking glass shards out of your face is fun. Who knew? So much of life has passed me by without my definition of "fun" including anything to do with cleaning up resin after an implosion. Little wonder I am such a boring guy.
 
tryppyr said:
I guess picking glass shards out of your face is fun.
Click to expand...

Come on now tryppyr its an implosion not an explosion, and if you set the jar in a trash can and it does implode, no muss no fuss

science my friend, its all about the science
 
John Katt said:
Come on now tryppyr its an implosion not an explosion, and if you set the jar in a trash can and it does implode, no muss no fuss

science my friend, its all about the science
Click to expand...

While I like the idea of putting the glass jars in the trash bin before the implosion, I must take issue with the claim that doing so constitutes science. Science is doing the math before running the experiment and determining whether the implosion is likely. Then doing some more math to determine how likely it is that the vacuum pressure would be adequate to have a meaningful impact on resin retention prior to the point of implosion. It would be doing the math to determine what sort of vessel (oh, say a pressure cooker) might be able to withstand the pressures needed to have a meaningful impact on resin retention, and by so doing reduce the likelihood of failure.

But science is hard. Happily, there's an easier way. Ask someone who has tried it before. Or even easier... do a search through the forum, because this subject comes up regularly and we have a number of threads that deal with this... including a few that used glass jars (to no good effect, I might add).
 
In my opinion you are wasting your time. Even stabilizing liquid from Turntex is ..really..no good...or at best a toy. Just send the stuff out to K&G or WSSI. Nothing else you can do at home is anywhere close to their quality. I know..I have tried everything!

John Lloyd
 
dang but thx for the info I was wanting to try the turntex system out. guess ill wait and just buy my stab wood
 
wow the train went off the tracks with that reply tryppry, The science that I mentioned was the fact that an implosion will not throw glass into your face, unless of course you have your nose on the jar looking at the pretty bubbles when it collapses, and for the last 6 months I have successfully stabilised several pieces of wood with my twin inline refrigerator compressor mason jar setup

But before I put valuable wood and resin into the jar I ran the system through at least 125 cycles with no failures, now would I take it to the next level and pressurize the jar to drive the resin in, not a chance in @#$%, the energy contained in a vacuum as opposed to a pressure filled vessel is miles apart

like I said before its not about the destination its about the ride
 
I have read a lot of posts that say don’t try to stabilize wood yourself, but I have yet to read a good reason why. Is it because the normal home shop guy doesn’t have a pump that will reach a low enough vacuum? Or is it because he doesn’t have accesses the proper stabilizing fluid? I would love to stabilize some of my own wood and have access to vacuum pumps that the normal guy would not but if it’s the fluid….well then I am SOL.
 
When I decided to do my own stabilizing nobody could convince me that I could not do as good as the pros for less money.
Why else would anyone want to do a messy job that cost a lot to do.
In the end I found the pros do a much better job for less money than doing it yourself.
If you have extra time and money and wood, might as well go for it.

BTW: the vacuum pump is just one of the items you will need. Unless you are into self mutilation I would stay away from glass chambers.
 
I think complete penetration is the only problem, or at least the only complaint I have seen, I think burlsource had that problem and because he had his eyes set on selling his product to the the general public it wasn't good enough for that

Now if i shape my handles to 80% of the final shape and i get 90% penetration, then that is more then enough to get a decent handle

If i was going to sell knives here on BF I wouldn't bother with the home brew stabilizer
 
John Katt said:
I think complete penetration is the only problem, or at least the only complaint I have seen, I think burlsource had that problem and because he had his eyes set on selling his product to the the general public it wasn't good enough for that

Now if i shape my handles to 80% of the final shape and i get 90% penetration, then that is more then enough to get a decent handle

If i was going to sell knives here on BF I wouldn't bother with the home brew stabilizer
Click to expand...

I was able to get complete penetration. But it was with a combination of vacuum and pressure.
Every different wood acted differently some requiring over a week under pressure.
Chemicals available over the counter was part of the problem. I tried most of what was available at the time. That was a few years back so there may be better chemicals available now that I never tried. I had gotten best results using resinol 90c. Had to buy it directly from Loctite at about $500 for 4 gallons.
In the end the cost of chemicals alone was about the same as what I now pay K&G for a better end product.

If someone wants to try do it your self stabilizing, use an easy to stabilize wood like maple, ash or box elder.

I did not want to come across as unreasonably discouraging or self serving. Just pointing out what I had to learn the hard/expensive way.
 
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