FibreGlast and Bergolin: Pioneering UV Resin Systems for Blade Repair

The Uptime Wind Energy Podcast

Allen and Joel speak to Michelle Bonnett from FibreGlast and Marvin Hirdler from Bergolin about their new UV-cured resin systems for repairing wind turbine blades. These UV resins allow for faster repairs in cold weather conditions when standard epoxy resins cannot cure properly. They're a game-changer for extending the wind turbine blade repair season and increasing technician productivity. Visit FibreGlast and Bergolin! Sign up now for Uptime Tech News, our weekly email update on all things wind technology. This episode is sponsored by Weather Guard Lightning Tech. Learn more about Weather Guard's StrikeTape Wind Turbine LPS retrofit. Follow the show on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Linkedin and visit Weather Guard on the web. And subscribe to Rosemary Barnes' YouTube channel here. Have a question we can answer on the show? Email us! Pardalote Consulting - https://www.pardaloteconsulting.comWeather Guard Lightning Tech - www.weatherguardwind.comIntelstor - https://www.intelstor.com Allen Hall: Welcome to the special edition of the Uptime Wind Energy podcast. I'm your host, Allen Hall, and I'm here with my co host, Joel Saxum. We're still in San Diego at ACP OM& S, and we have run into a bunch of new technology while we've been at the show, and one of them is UV cured resin systems, because when it's cold outside, You really can't use standard epoxies and it's cold in most of America and the world right now. Yeah. So all repair businesses essentially shut down until it gets to about 50 degrees Fahrenheit which could be a while, particularly in the Northern latitudes. So we run into Marvin Hirdler with Bergolin and Bergolin has a new product in the UV space and also Michelle Bonnett with FibreGlast. And I have worked with, I've purchased some FibreGlast material, UV care material. And it's really awesome, actually for some projects that we were working on. This, I really want to just touch on the UV space because there hasn't been a lot of UV resin applications in wind. We had touched From aerospace background. We have used it there but in the wind world, we haven't, which is crazy because we our season is so short, the repair season's crazy. Sure. And you're up tower and yeah, tower and access is tough. It's really hard. But these new UV resin systems are magical. It's crazy good. And as, as a, as someone who's tried it, it's amazing. It's amazing, and I'm surprised we haven't done this years earlier, but it's, it's finally coming to market. I want to talk about this, the one I use first, which is the FibreGlast repair patch. So Michelle, maybe you can introduce yourself a little bit, but you guys, FibreGlast is based in Ohio, right? So you're a U. S. based company, and FibreGlast does all kinds of things, fiber related, resin related, you're like a resource. Michelle Bonnett: Yes. Correct. Where we've been in business for about 65 years where our website is fibreglast.com. We sell to a guy in his garage doing a small repair to a lot of large companies in the aerospace automotive. And of course wind. We Work predominantly with small quantities. We ship them very fast. If you order before two 30 Eastern time, they ship same day. So it is imperative in the wind industry to get those products out quick. We teamed up with a company called SunRes that has been an industry leader in UV for about correct me if I'm wrong, but around 30 years. And recently got GE approved UV prepreg. So it's a 300 by 700 millimeter patch. It comes in UD1000, Biax 806, and the Combi 900. It is a vinyl ester resin. That is cured UV. You can typically lay up about 10 layers. Very easy patches that you can build very quickly, get it up to the blade and apply. Joel Saxum: One of the things I want to touch on that you said there, and this is super important for the space, right? Anybody that's an ISP, blade repair, that's listing, or an asset owner, is that it is GE approved. Yes. Because I know we were at Blades USA,