Mold for manufacturing a fiber reinforced polymer utility vault lid

A mold for molding a fiber reinforced polymer

• material utility vault lid comprising:
• a cavity die having a mold surface;
• a core die having a telescoping shear edge for interfacing the core die within the cavity die, wherein the fiber reinforced polymer material utility vault lid having a plurality of individual fibers within polymer material is molded between the cavity die and the core die;
• and
• a lid ejection mechanism for removing the molded lid from the mold;
• wherein the mold surface of the cavity die has a textured surface along the entire mold surface comprising a pattern of non-uniform spaced recesses extending into the mold surface of different sizes and depths and a plurality of protrusions of irregular height, size and shape, a protrusion of the plurality of protrusions being positioned between each recess and extends outwardly to engage and push the individual fibers of the fiber reinforced polymer material utility vault lid inwardly away from an upper surface of the lid to create a resin rich layer above the individual fibers along the upper surface of the lid during molding and preventing the individual fibers from reaching the upper surface of the lid.