Stablizing wood and the vacuum chamber

[Francesco_Verderosa]

Hello Makers,

I want to use the vacuum pump under the small CNC to stabilize some blue spalted wood I came across.

A few questions:

1. Is the chamber in working order? most posts about it are rather old.
2. Does anyone / the space have a small amount of stabilizer I could buy off them? My piece is small (30x30x15mm ish) and is a test. The bottles of stabilizer/hardener are relatively large and pricey, so would love to try before committing to a large bottle.
3. Does anyone have recommendations for stabilizers? I know of Cactus/wood Juice and penta/polycryl, but wonder if there are more ‘off the shelf’ solutions.

Thanks!

[asander1 (Andy Sanderson)]

Hi!

This one should be working, let us know if it is not. If I recall you need to press on the lid thingy to get it to seal…

Vacuum Pump and Chamber

Details Located under Mini-CNC. Pump: Edwards Speedivac 2 Single stage 180W fore vacuum pump, direct drive rotary vane 45 litre/minute Max vacuum 13Pa (0.098 mmHg) residual 0.5 liters of oil full load Chamber (20 litres - 29cm diameter 30cm height cylinder) Solid steel + 10mm thick acrylic glass cover Festo vacuum meter gauge Pump and release valves Primary use is degassing silicone for moulds, removing bubbles in polyurethane and epoxy castings, removing air from liquids and soaking poro…

[stefanoromano]

The vacuum chamber you mentioned works perfectly, the only quirk is that you have to kneel on the lid for the first 30sec to a minute for the vacuum to start compressing the seal, then you are all good to stand up and watch the magic happen.