Where to buy big pieces of carbon fiber?

deathofallthings

deathofallthings

@DeathGripScales
Joined
Jan 3, 2011
Messages
914
So google didn't bring me much on this topic. I used to buy carbon fiber in little scale size pieces from knife making websites. However I have a cnc mill up and running now, going to be making a lot more of them. Doesn't make sense for me to buy the small pieces and deal with their mark up and all that. I'm looking to buy sizes more like 1/4 and 3/16 by 6x36 or 12x36. I'm also having trouble finding the pattern I'm looking for in the carbon fiber. My favorite was the 690 carbon fiber that USAKnifemaker sells, looks similar to what benchmade and ZT use, but everywhere else I look I see things like 3k 6k 12k, nothing like 670 690.

I tried getting a piece from dragonplate, but it seems while they're carbon fiber is carbon fiber all the way through, it's a fine weave on the top and bottom and then a very coarse weave in the middle... came out looking terrible after it was shaped into a contour. I was pretty angry over that since they don't mention it on their website.

So if any of you knife makers can help me out, educate me on what I'm looking for and where I might find it in larger pieces at a good price, please let me know.
 
deathofallthings said:
....looks similar to what benchmade and ZT use....
Click to expand...
We've sold carbon fiber from several manufacturers including some listed in this thread. The best carbon fiber by far is LVA® (Low Void Aerospace) made by Matt Diskin. This is the carbon fiber used by ZT. We will have some larger sheets in stock again soon.

All CF has voids and/or air bubbles. Any manufacturer who says their CF does not have voids is not being honest. We've noticed the quality is dependant on the worker laying up the material. When an experienced employee made the CF, the voids were small. When a new employee made the sheet, the voids were large. This is frustrating when you are trying to provide a consistent material. We scrapped several sheets of CF because we were not satisfied with the quality.

We sell LVA®. This material has the highest quality, smallest voids and best consistency of any carbon fiber sheet we've ever sold. The key to the quality is how the carbon fiber sheets are made. LVA is made on a press that generates 1,800 tons of pressure (3,600,000 pounds). The high pressure compresses each layer to .007" thick. Most carbon fiber sheet is made using the vacuum bagging process. The layers are stacked and a bag is put over the sheets. Vacuum is applied and atmospheric pressure presses the carbon fiber sheets together. Some manufacturers place the vacuum bag in an autoclave and apply 50-400 pounds of pressure. The vacuum bag process is not as good as a high pressure press at removing voids.

We have a carbon fiber information page at the link below:
http://www.alphaknifesupply.com/zdata-carbonfiber.htm
 
Shoot me an email, I have a friend with a bunch of CF just sitting around. woodandsteel.biz [@] gmail.com
 
Heck, I tried to sell some pieces on here, but I evidently don't have the right membership so I went to the auction site.

Good luck with search, let us know how it went.

Larry
Tinkerer
 
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