How does an apartment dweller who likes to make bows store a 7'x1'x2' heat box? Well, I'm getting some cores and bamboo from David Knight and I figured I'd start using a heat box. In the past I've played around with EA-40 (Smooth On), but I've always let it cure at room temperature for 24 hours. I know you get a quicker cure but also a stronger cure if you bake it at 150F for 6 hours. David uses Urac for his glue-ups he said, however I still have plenty of Smooth On so I figured I'd use it up. Anyway, I figured I'd start making more laminated bows so I figured now was as good a time as any to make a heat box. However, I wanted it to be able to bake a 72" longbow which meant it needed to be about 7' long, at least 1' wide and about 2' tall to accommodate the form and clamps. That's a pretty big box to try to store out of the way, especially if you make it out of plywood. My first thought was to make it out of cheap OSB and line it with Reflectix. I thought about it and ended up deciding to make a wood/foam hybrid box. I saw a heat box when I was searching the webz that was made all out of reflective faced foam board. I wanted something lightweight but a box like that derives it's strength from being completely fastened together. That still wouldn't solve my problem. So, I did some cipherin' and came up with a rigid frame with OSB top and bottom and sides with 1x2 pine furring stripes for a frame to strengthen it. The whole thing fastens together with 1/4" bolts and wing nuts and is lined with 1/2" reflective faced insulation. The sides are the foam just in panels. The only thing I have to do to complete the box is to attach some small metal pieces to the wing nuts to hold the foam panels in place and a switch plate to cover the box for my rheostat. I also need to pick up a thermometer to monitor temperature. What do you guys use for thermometers in your heat boxes? Anyway, the whole thing breaks down pretty small and I can store the pieces on the shelving unit in my work area, thus keeping my work space free to tiller bows out or whatever. Anyway, here are the photos:
Box with lid on
Lid up showing light fixtures (I'll use 4 100W bulbs) - and reflective faced foam board
Box broken down
Box stowed up out of the way on a shelf
