Anyone tried to make their own carbon orthotics/shoes

[zappafile123]

For whatever reason it seems like trying to make my own orthotics and eventually a Hanseeno type shoes might be a fun thing to do.

Have any of you ever worked on a project like this or know anyone who has who might have some recommendations for literature/have general tips and tricks up their sleeve?

I figured one way to do it is basically just whack 5 or 6 12k weave sheets on a plastic wrapped cast of my foot and use vacuum resin infusion to get a hard epoxy in there. The tricky part is using more complex layups (i.e. any different layups) and/or fusing different carbon parts with different properties together. For example you might want the heel/arch region to be pretty hard, but you'd want the toe region to be flexy for which you'd need to use different epoxys. Obviously you could do it by just using different prepregs but... I dont have the equipment/am not willing to spend $$$ to get set up to work with prepgreg. From scratch I think it'd cost about $350AUD to make a pair of orthotics. I believe a podiatrist will charge about $900, but I could be wrong.

Re making Hanseeno shoes, I imagine you'd just make the last and the uppers separately and just glue them together. Not sure who you'd bond the threads for the cleats into the carbon...

[spud]

I've made carbon orthotics, not too difficult. I used flower foam (the stuff that crushes with no elasticity) to make a foot box into which I stepped - leaves a perfect imprint of the bottom of my foot. Adjust the mould to get ride of detains around toes, and try to get the camber similar to what you find in a shoe. Pour plaster into mold, let it set. Now you've got a negative and positive mould, put carbon between plastic wrap and lay into the mould. Will require some trimming when removed, and it isn' the prettiest thing in the world, but it works.

[LouisN]

I did pretty much the dame with plaster for the mold. I pût multiple carbon layerscwith époxy, pût everything in a vacuum bag, sucked the air out and let it sit for 24hrs.
Very light and stiff !! The fit was good (after trimming) but not so shure about correct podiatric position.
Louis

[zappafile123]

Below the review DrTriKat shows us his own carbon shoes. It looks like a pretty good attempt, but it seems obvious that he went too far in trying to make a one piece shoe. Its impractical to have the uppers ultra rigid and for the sole to encompass the toes. Nevertheless, a damn good effort.

http://forum.slowtwitch.com/forum/Slowt ... wqmxntuirw

[TheKaiser]

Below the review DrTriKat shows us his own carbon shoes. It looks like a pretty good attempt, but it seems obvious that he went too far in trying to make a one piece shoe. Its impractical to have the uppers ultra rigid and for the sole to encompass the toes. Nevertheless, a damn good effort.

http://forum.slowtwitch.com/forum/Slowt ... wqmxntuirw

Thanks for that slowtwitch link, I hadn't seen DrTriKat's thread before. This is a topic that has been of interest to me for a while as well. Any updates on your orthotic or shoe project yet? I'd love to see how it goes with as many pics as you care to share.

[TheKaiser]

I just happened across this article about flexible carbon fabric that Scott is using in their shoes: https://www.bikerumor.com/2017/10/27/sc ... -carbitex/

The fabric is made by these guys: http://www.carbitex.com/

Their process is somewhat of a trade secret, although I think they have a few patents that may shed some light on what they are doing. I found an article that said they buy prewoven fabric, but no real mention of what resins they use. If one could do something similar, it could be cool to use in certain spots on DIY full carbon shoes if you were worried about pressure from the foot swelling or if you wanted to allow for the "spreading" action of the foot structure when applying downforce.