For some reason I thought Aquaseal took longer to cure, but if you read the directions then I believe you.
Different manufacturers use different construction technics for their wings. For example, Oxycheq uses a much thicker bladder and sprays the shell with urethane. Halcyon uses some sort of ballistic nylon for the bladder, which is more resistant to pinch flats. Do you have a clear/opaque bladder or a black one? My understanding is the black one is thicker and more resistant to pinch flats.
Uh well no not exactly. Nobody "sprays urethanes" on wing shells. Most wing shell fabrics have a "kiss coat" of thin urethane on the inner surface to reduce fraying. The only genuine "ballistic" nylon is duplex weave 1050 denier. This produced by twisting two 1050 denier threads together and using that paired fiber to weave the fabric. "Ballistic" nylon is what was used for flak jackets prior to the UHMWPE materials like kevlar and Spectra, nobody is laminating urethane to genuine 1050 and using it for bladders.
DSS uses a 30 mil urethane film for our bladders. Nobody I know of uses a thicker material for bladders. We have it custom made by a urethane film mill. Why do we use this material? Simple we impact tested a wide variety of materials, including laminates (thin nylons with thin urethane films glues to them, think smb or lift bag.) and found the thicker urethanes performed the best in impact. Impact is what causes bladders to pinch flat. We built a repeatable impact device that would drop a weighted rod fitted with a 1" ball bearing onto a hardened and ground steel plate. We could control the height for repeatability.
BTW impact testing is the reason we use true 1050 ballistic nylons for shells. No wing needs the strength of a genuine duplex weave 1050 denier ballistic, the advantage of the 1050 vs 1000 denier or "pretend" ballistic (1600) is the ability of the duplex weave to attenuate impact. Real basket weave duplex 1050 is thicker and "springy" which helps to absorb impact.
Which would you expect to better absorb impact, a thick springy outer shell fabric and a thick (30 mil) resilient inner bladder or a relatively thin flat weave outer shell and a thin inner bladder with a couple mils of urethane laminated to it?
We also found that no combination of outer shell and inner bladder was impervious to impact. If you drop your plate edgewise on your wing from any height above about 6 inches expect to damage the bladder. Proper use and care remains the best defense against pinches.
I should note that many wings are produced using 12 or 15 mil urethane bladders. (Jobber stock this material and one need not order a custom mill run of thousand of pounds) We tried that early on and found they were too easily pinched. DSS has not produced a wing with thin urethane in many years. Thin straight urethane films and thin urethane laminates are also tricky to weld. There have been more than one recall from wing brands using laminates due to failures in the fitting welds.
Tobin
---------- Post added March 23rd, 2015 at 10:46 PM ----------
I think you are being a bit of an alarmist. Stuart fixed the wing using patches and aquaseal so the integrity of the wing should be intact. There is no way a little leak is going to develop into a big leak. Zeagle even sells a BC repair kit with patches. I am sure Tobin doesn't want to patch wings because it is not worth his while to do so. It is quicker for him (and not that much more expensive for the customer) just to replace the bladder.
Tobin doesn't patch wings because 1) the process is hard to control 2) It makes his insurance carrier unhappy. I doubt you will find another wing maker that sells replacement bladders installed and tested as inexpensively as we do. $50 for singles wing 60 for a doubles wing.
Tobin