I love lasers!!

For the past two years I have been so scared of the laser cutter at uni but this term it has become my new best friend! And now i am authorised to use it on my own ive been having great fun with it.

The dream machine!

laser cutting onto neoprene

I have been greatly surprised at how well this worked engraving onto neoprene, and didnt seem to affect the strength of it either, so could defiantly be a possibility for embelisment onto my wetsuits if it will cost too much to screen print!

Gluing Samples

The time has come to try out some gluing samples!

You may think this looks odd, and this is not how you glue wetsuits...and you would be right, but because of my mens chestzip wetsuits I have some panels that are going to have to overlap and be stuck together flat, rather than along the edges. So with this sample i have put a thick layer of glue on and am leaving it for 24 hours to soak through the Nylon lining, then adding another layer before putting them together!(I have been told this is the best way to make it strong without wasting glue!)

I am also doing samples of single, double and triple glues seams to see which works best!

Sample madness!

Glue!!!!

wooo! We finally broke open the neoprene glue today and I put some in a little tin (to try and preserve the rest in the big tin) and its so miniature its cute!!!

Latex Neoprene Anyone?

After i tried screen printing I then made a stencil on some acetate and used some liquid Latex to try making a print style pattern but it would be really subtle because it was clear latex and so it just gives a nice shine where the print is.

Acetate stuck to the neoprene with double sided tape to try and stop it moving.

It's so runny i just put a big blob on and spread it around with a stick!! (it looks so disgusting!)

all the stencil covered!

the end result when the acetate is peeled off! (it dries clear though)

I was a bit gutted that however hard i tried it just kept seeping under the edges of the cut outs on the template! but could be a good idea if i can stop it spreading!

Homemade Screen Printing!

The lovely technicians at fine art gave me a small screen printing screen for free last week, and today i finally put it to the test! I decided to do it old school by using paper and double sided tape to make the image on the screen, with help from a scalpel and the laser cutter!!

The samples are a bit hit and miss! half because I've only ever screen printed once before and also because i had very limited choice in what colour inks were laying around and they didnt work great on dark neoprene!!

These samples worked quite well, apart from I didn't really put enough ink on and the squeegee is about half the size of the screen so I couldn't get an even coverage, but I'm happy with it as a sample. I also did some samples on black neoprene with bright blue ink but it was a complete fail because you can't see the screen print at all!

2 inch wave!

Today is starting to feel like spring is nearly here!!! I decided to walk home the scenic route from uni via Gylly and Swanpool beaches. I was entertained for ages on my walk by watching some people trying to surf at swanpool on waves that were about 2 inches high!!! love some peoples optimism!!!

YouTube Channel

Sailing Betty now has a You Tube Channel!! All the Video's from Carnac 2010 are now up there!
http://www.youtube.com/user/SailingBetty