Sewing Kevlar cloth

[Moondog55]

Anybody here have any experience with sewing Kevlar??

I just found a section in the garage I had forgotten about.
It is the loosely woven stuff for epoxy resin use but I figure I can use it for a stove flap if I silicon it heavily.

I figure if I can do this I'll run the stove flue up to the peak of the tipi and use the new pole to help the flues stability and I will use the Kevlar for its strength in the peak at the same time, I think for 3 sections of the hexagon

[wayno]

i'd juset test how much force it takes to put a normal sewing needle through it first , to make sure it doesnt break your sewing machine needles.

[Moondog55]

Sews easily enough by hand as it is a very loose weave but I haven't yet tried it on the machine. I need to buy a new tool to cut it with.

[wayno]

see what happens when you try putting the nedle directly through the fibre, the sewing machine is bound to hit the fibres directly

[Moondog55]

Actually I thought that the needle point was designed to go between the fibers. I'll set the machine up soon and give a scrap a try-out.

[gayet]

A ball point needle will roll off the fibres while a standard sharp point will tend to pierce. A ball point is all you would need I imagine, although make it a sturdy one I guess.

[Nuts]

You mean the yellow square woven cloth? Cant see why it wouldn't sew, it wont be under pressure as a stove port I guess. You can get rovings to sew it too itself.

I cut up a fire blanket for a stove jack many moons ago, the cloth ended up saggy iirc, guess ridiculously heavy for tent weight polyester. I hand sewed it most likely. Cut up some bbq liner last year for stove bases and thought it would be worth a try as a stove jack if it would glue (to cuben fibre in that case). Doubt anything would glue teflon.. anyhow, getting off topic- Let us know if the Kevlar sews ok, don't see why not, parting the fibres sounds right. Is it waterproof on its own?

[Moondog55]

No Nuts it's an open weave Kevlar meant for making boats/canoes/kayaks with. I would use high temperature or plumbers silicon for the waterproofing and to stop it fraying if I miss a few threads.
At this stage I only mean to waterproof the outer cap and leave the inner part uncoated to allow the tent to "Breath" a little.
All the better tipis and lavvus seem to use a central flue. Hand sewing around the flue hole would be easy enough. A machine stitch would be stronger than my hand sewing. This is an instance where I will be making an accurate template from stiff cardboard and checking things at least 3 times before stitching

[Moondog55]

Sews easily, actually sews better with a smaller needle too, I'm using a # 12 not the usual #18 I use on canvas. My beloved has some teflon coated ball points in her sewing kit and later I'll try one of those to see if there is any real difference