Large Scale Wood impregnation

Let's forego all of the locker room jokes on this title... :D

I'm looking to experiment with vacuum impregnating large scale wood pieces - i.e. bartops and live edge tables from porous woods like western pine.

The thought is that I would wrap a long beam such as a bar top with top and bottom plastic, seal the two layers into a "bag" and create resin input lines at the ends and the vacuum port at the center or vice versa.
The resin would carry a pigment (such as black) and flow into the pores, colorizing it into unique patterns as well as sealing it and making it very polishable and clean.
I would then air or heat cure (possibly UV lamps or a "heat box" out back) then sand and polish.

Has anyone tried this on a scale larger than wood tuning pen blanks? Resources? Ideas? Suggestions? Adult Supervision?

Thanks!

~Angelo

Have you considered pressure impregnation rather than vacuum? You are going to be working with resins that have a pot life by the sound of it and the pot life determines how long you have to get the resin into the pores. This approach also applies force to the entire surface of the timber rather than relying on vacuum from a couple of locations. The pressure vessel will be a fair size although scrap metal dealers commonly have old air receivers that would be a starting point. They preservative treat timber with pressure after all. Cheers

Where I worked, they tried impregnating wood with a preservative made from soy bean oil. They had a chamber that they would first pull a vacuum and then pressurize for extended periods of time. The vacuum alone didn't do much in terms of penetration into the wood. When you release the vacuum, you only get 14 psi pressure, which isn't much to push liquid into the pores.

Interesting idea but in my experience vacuum bags are not a great choice for impregnating wood with resin. Inevitably, your vacuum port will suck up some of the resin into your vacuum and that ain't good. If you can build a large, solid chamber, you'd be better off. And you really need a window so you can see what's going on inside.

im curious why you would want to try to impregnate a slab? Unlike a bowl or a pen, most of the impregnated material in a slab will be stuck inside where it can't be seen (assuming you are finishing them flat).

boat builders are known to make a slurry out of thinned out epoxy and coat large sections of wood in order to "stabilize" them.... might be something to look into. If you build a giant vacuum chamber, please post photos!

What you are trying to do is done all the time on large fiberglass parts like boats. They have a rigid fiberglass mold and they lay out fiberglass matt onto the mold. There is thin plastic available for this purpose that is sealed around the edge of the mold and infusion couplers are put in the plastic and vacuum suction ports in other areas. The vacuum pulls the resin in and it soaks the resin as it's pulled towards the vacuum port. There are secondary catch pots made so the resin does not get sucked into the vacuum pump.
For what you are trying to do, check out Smooth-On website. They make all types of silicone molding rubbers as well as resins. They sell a product called EZ Brush vacuum bag silicone. It is a rubber that you can use to make your own vacuum bags in whatever size you want. These bags are reuseable. Check out you tube videos on this process. You could use epoxies, polyester resins or urethanes to accomplish what you have in mind. All of those have different properties, open pot times and cure times. It is all do-able but may be a bigger project than you are looking for.. Good luck