Modifications to Liner Material
[This is probably the strangest of the ideas presented. But it can be made to work and is listed here just to be somewhat complete.]
The most obvious liner modification is to stretch the liner material end to end several times before installation. Latex is a strange substance. It is a natural polymer. It has a wonderful random alignment of its molecules which makes natural latex superior in some applications to the more regimented orientation typical of the synthetic rubber versions. When first made a natural latex product also has some weak cross linking that makes it initially stiffer than it needs to be.
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The Virgin Rubber's Green Flash Take a virgin rubber band, brand new out of a fresh box of rubber bands, preferably about 1/4 inch wide and natural colored. Never touched before. Go into a nice dark place with it and after your eyes get used to the darkness, rapidly stretch it. You may be quite shocked to see it light up with a rather bright green glow radiating out of the latex! What you are seeing is some of this energy being dissipated, some of the cross linking of a certain type, being broken and the molecules being aligned. You may also notice the rubber band is now softer, with noticeable different properties. A given section of the rubber band only flashes once, by the way. |
You can treat liner material the same way, though I doubt if you
will get a nice green flash. You can stretch it a number of times lengthwise to
free it up and get it nice and flexible before you install it. It will still
respond by getting softer and more pliable in that direction, even without the
green flash.
But you can also stretch liner material stock in another way. You can stopper one end with a solid large cork or rubber stopper firmly attached with rubber bands. Then plug the other end of about a 12-inch length of liner material with a one hole rubber stopper or cork on the other end. Now you can pump the liner material up with a pump of the type used for basketballs and such. Such small hand pumps often come with a long tapered fitting that will go right into the hole in a one hole rubber stopper.
When you inflate the liner material it will balloon out in the middle. Now some
of it will burst, but if you have a good batch it can be inflated over a
significant part of its length and left for several minutes. When deflated
you will find it is permanently bulged out in the middle. If you try this be
sure to use precautions like eye protection etc. If one does burst it can
make quite a bang.
This bulged out area makes the compliment of a constrictor.
This liner now has thicker ends relative to its middle which are of a smaller
diameter. After an effective inflation, the section is like a 225 liner with a
4-inch length long center section that is 250 material.
This can be installed complete with constrictors and so forth but you end up
with a liner even bigger and looser fitting section in the middle.
An ideal liner would have this property. It would be thicker latex on the two ends, especially the entrance end, and wider and thinner material in the middle for better action. Attempts were made to create such a liner by casting and other methods but they never quite worked.
So far getting lucky with a section of
liner that can be pumped up like a balloon and left to stretch without bursting,
is the closest I have been able to come to creating such a liner that is a
smaller thicker section on each end and a wider thinner section in the middle.
While it may not be too obvious in the picture, the center liner section which
has been inflated, has a significantly softer and thinner center section that
the two unmodified examples above and below it.
As I said, if you try this please be careful and take precautions, expecting the liner material to burst as it often does when inflated.
| 08/04 |
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