Rescued from another forum...........


heres a couple of pics of what ive been upto


before mods my old front.


modded areas in wax [yellow], basically I have removed the bumper cut out and reshaped this area with some of it blended in around the lights yet still a 'chin' around the rad opening, difficult to explain.



wax painted red to get a proper look at it and lights and numberplate dropped inplace, smoothes the front out loads and gives it a bonnevile speed trail look I think


the moulding begins hope I can get it out once it is finished.

cant wait to get a bit more done, have to wait a bit tho as busy with work and other activites for a couple of weeks.

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Hi boys and girls well over the crimbo break I managed to get some time off work and spent most of it on the project over 15hours of just lamintaing has been done so far, plus the time preping, shuttering cutting glass mixing up etc etc so total time = LOADS




Shuttering







Its taking ages and I have now ran out of glass, time to get some more and do the last 1/4.

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An Update March 06

well I had what I called the Weekender a flat out weekend on the car and heres the rewards


precut glass


Gelcoat


resin





dada

one very near complete mould just a little more to do then its time to get cracking on the carbon, More updates Next Week hopefully

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And another update, pictures speak louder than words






Like cracking a large easter egg


Wing


A flat pack mold

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How much do You expect to save in weight or is the carbon for strenght & stifness?

Malcolm.

My current GFRP Front weighs 19Kgs bare, and with Carbon/Kevlar being slightly Stiffer but lighter with the right layup im looking for 10Kgs, the maths suggests a little lighter but 10 is the realistic target.

Shame its all front weight as i want to loose weight of the rear, but that will come in time hopefully, will try to find the latest pictures from the camera later

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UpDate October 07, 2 years on since the start of this project


Mold Reassembly, and the relisation that its going to need a little work to get ready/suitable for molding including rubbing some of the mold back and sorting a couple of flaws


Ready to be realeased and Braced to insure the correct width


A suitable name i think for the release wax and as a belt and braces i also used PVA release. about 6 coats of wax i lost count to be honest, then the PVA


Gel coat, this was used so that i have a suitable surface to rub back so i can paint the front.


Pre cut pieces of Carbon fibre


Layer one of Carbon, what a mad man i was trying to do this layer in the minimum number of pieces, the main part of the front is just over a meter square piece of carbon wrestling to get this down as neat as possible was a struggle, plus this is wet layup which makes it even more messy and time consuming


Core in the wings, by adding a core material [foam] you can stiffen up a composite massively for minimum weight gain.


The lovely Kevlar layer, which was alot of hard work to cut, can see why its used in bullet proof vests etc.


More Carbon after putting the core material in over the central part of the front.


Finally done, notice the additional kevlar in the wheel arches, the arches have core and and extra layer of kevlar directly above the wheel, hopefully this will minimise any damage from stones etc.


A Oven Insulation board of a convient size made an excellant oven quickly


And radiator, low bake at 27 degrees and a final bake with the space heater at a slightly elevated temperature.

What a project what a silly idea all this was the work involved has been imense, going to leave it in the mold for a while need a break from this again, once its out can look at fitting the mounts and working out inner arches, plus find out what it weighs.


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Looks good Neil. Looking forward to seeing the finished product.

Very professional looking split moulds there. It's always a relief when something that size actually lets go and releases cleanly. I'm looking forward to seeing the finished article.

I bought a pair of Teflon coated shears specifically to cut Kevlar.

A quick update, popped it out the mold at the weekend





A few small air bubbles to sort in the gel coat unfortantly so will have to be sorted before painting etc. was a little disapointed with the bubbles but its my first attempt at this but i liked the result when i weighed it

8Kg, thats un trimmed still with peel ply on it, so with those removed, the mounts added and inner arches [once ive decided how to do them] it should beat the target weight of 10K just about hopefully

Oh and the flashng from the split lines is so minimal its awesome like just hair line

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So Neil, is the next step to make the rear of the car the same way?

I'd imagine you could save a fair bit of weight from doing that. Especially as the bodywork of the car from the rear bulkhead backwards is non load bearing, you could make it really thin!

Oh, and of course, the doors could be done too!

OK I'm going to ask a stupid question.

It's a mixture of kevlar and carbon fibre.

What the ****** do You use to cut out the head lights etc ??

Fair Question,

When i layed up the kevlar i made sure there was no kevlar near the headlights and edges to be trimmed. you can cut kevlar, its a bit hard going but can be done, the main problem you have it leaves a fluffy edge. but by controlling my lay up this problem should be minimised in the trimmed areas

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I was going to ask "what the dickens" but I didn't want John thinkng I was taking the P out of his name

Oh my, there is a few hours worth of work there! Fair effort though, producing your own mould for the front end! and then producing one in CF!