Aquapark - Water Slide Production Process
First of all, the more flawless and error-free the molds used in the production of water slides, the more beautiful the product processed on it. The process starts with the drawing of the product in question, then the model is produced and after all the desired changes are made on the model, the mold is taken from the model. The production process is finalized by taking the product from the mold.
When processing on the mold, first of all, a separating agent is applied to the cleaned mold to facilitate the separation of the processed product from the mold. In the next process, high performance gelcoat in the desired color code (Some manufacturers use normal gelcoat instead of high performance gelcoat in order to reduce production costs. The feature of high performance gelcoat is that it is much more resistant to water flowing through the slide, chlorine, chemicals used during cleaning and UV rays). At this stage, if the customer's request is a patterned slide, the required pattern is processed on the mold. The processed gelcoat should be applied at least 2 coats so that there is no paint opening on the slide, and 3 coats cause cracks. Some manufacturers who want to reduce costs apply gelcoat in a single layer.
After the gelcoat dries, polyester fiber processing should be started. In this part, there is a difference between RTM production and hand lay-up production. In general, 7 layers of 450mak fiber are processed with polyester and this process should be done by feeding the polyester into the fiber. In RTM production, polyester is given to the fiber in the closed mold with polyester injector machines at a certain temperature. In production in accordance with the standards, there should be at least 6mm body and 10mm flange thickness. Although there is no harm in too much, too little will cause the product to deform rapidly in the future. In order to reduce the cost, some manufacturers reduce the fiber layer here or use 300 instead of 450 fiber, and use chemicals that increase the brittleness and thickness, which we call calcite. As STY Composite, we must make it clear to all our customers that all of our productions comply with the standards.
The necessary cutting and grinding operations of the product taken from the processed mold are carried out, topcoat paint is applied to the back part and final controls are made. In RTM molds, there is no need for topcoat primer paint because the product is gelcoated back and front.
