That's pretty good man, not bad for a rough draft. And it makes the 2 + 2 better looking.

 

For sure. Thanks for the input.

 

I likey. And it wouldn't be too difficult to make either.

Now, if I could just get started I'm working on it. It'll be soon. Very soon.

And s/c, I did some research on the thermal properties of resins (carbons not the problem) and you could probably actually make the rear most section of the exhaust piping out of CF. It wouldn't stand up before the cat though. Room or High temp cure resins both only stand up to so much heat and neither would probably be able to withstand the heat produced near the exhaust manifold. So a CF exhaust is a possibility. But then there's the problem of how long it'll last through all that heat cycling I guess the only way to tell is to make one and see how long it last

 

they make CF exhausts for crotch rockets so its definitely doable

 

Hey J I was wondering how much is that foam your buying costing you, and if you could can you hook me up with there web site so i could order some.

 

I assume you're talking about the foam for carving out shapes, right? If so there are so many sources for it. Just run a search for fiberglass supply or composites supply and any of the major suppliers will carry an assortment of foams. Me personally, I just get mine at a crafts store. But once I start carving out a front bumper I'm going to order some of the 2 part foam online. You mix it up and it expands like 300% or something like that. The only problem with foam is that it's messy (you just can't sweep it up either. It's gotta be vacuumed) and you also have to invest in a good deal of body filler cause the foam will break down in the presence of a lot of chemicals. The body filler provides a good barrier and allows you to get the surface perfect.

To get you started try www.uscomposites.com (where I get a lot of my stuff) and www.fiberglast.com
Other than that just do some searching like I said and you'll find a bunch of places that sell foam. Of course if you're talking about something else then let me know and I'll point you in that direction If you need any other help with composites or anything, just let me know.

 

if you're thinking about mixing your own foam just be careful, that stuff gets mighty hot and expands so fast that it my catch you by surprise. its also virtually impossible to get it off of your clothes, hands, or anything else. i used to work in a warehouse and we used it to package huge computer monitors for shipment. the stuff we used might be too soft and fluffy to be useful for carving. it will likely start coming apart once you start cutting it unless you use a rotary blade or some other rotary type tool for shaping. its pretty hard to get a clean cut through that stuff with just a blade

this is what i did for like 6 moths, worst job ever

 

Yeah learned the hard way about expanding foam. I poured some in a bucket and the stuff didn't stop expanding until it overflowed the bucket and engulfed it. THen I had to toss the whole thing cause I couldn't get the foam off. A little goes a long way. I've found the best way to get it cut down to workable size blocks is with a hot wire but you gotta wear a mask cause the fume are pretty potent. After that I just use a knife to carve off little chunks to get a basic shape and then I sand from there. After that I start piling on the body filler. I go through buckets of that stuff cause it's gotta be really thick to work out all the imperfections. And you definitely gotta catch it in the cheese grater stage or you'll be sanding for months. Don't ask how I know that Just a little bit of info on plug making.

 

So is my hood done yet??

 

Well, I have some REALLY bad news Especially for you s/c. Well the company I was going to use to supply my carbon just informed me that they no longer have any in stock. Not just the stuff I was going to use but any carbon at all. If you're thinking big deal get it somewhere else. Well thats the problem. Nobody else carries it. See the 280zx is just wide enough and definitely long enough that the most commonly available size of wide cf fabric is not big enough. See the hood measured in at right around 50" and the widest you can get the stuff is in 50". Well the edges of the cloth is already partially frayed when you get it and the slightest mishap makes it even worse. The supplier I had carried it in 60" widths which was plenty wide. Now this is for the 2x2 twill that we're all so familiar with. It leaves that sort of diagonal pattern that looks so great. Now if someone really wants a cf hood I can still possibly secure some plain weave in the 60" width. This is just plain checker pattern cf that you see in a lot of interiors and when you see interior pieces with the 'carbon' look, that's usually plain weave. So if there is any interest in plain weave cf let me know and I'll inquire about it and see if they have any in stock. The company that supplies the 60" twill said they don't plan to have any in stock until sometime next year!!! So if you don't want to wait then it's gotta be plain weave or fiberglass. I also have one company that claims to have 60" wide Kevlar if you want something rivaling CF in strenght to weight but it would have to be painted as Kevlar is kinda ugly like fiberglass.

So here's the deal. If anyone wants a cf hood in plain weave then let me know. If I don't get any interest in the plain weave then I'm going to concentrate on other parts that use smaller sheets of CF. I'm pretty sure the hood is the only part too wide. Maybe the hatch but I have a feeling it's not quite as wide as the hood. If nobody wants the plain weave then I'm still going to make the mold so I can pull fiberglass hoods for really cheap to sell. I'll also be making the cowl induction fiberglass hood as soon as I pull the mold from the stock hood. I'm gonna overlay a couple of interior parts in CF and let you guys see how that looks and then if you want something overlayed you can just send me the parts to be overlayed. That would be signifigantly cheaper than a pure CF part since no mold and less material is used. I'm also going to start making CF radio plates for aftermarked head units. Those will be simple and cheap. I'm sorry for the bad news and I'll post up some pics of the difference between different fabrics here in a minute. I move in tomorrow so once everythings set up and I get the rest of my supplies I'm gonna start busting out parts. Overlays I can do sooner than later

 

I will take a plain weave.. No biggy, itll still be carbon.. Whats your address I will just ship my car.. Anything that can be removed just wrap it I will also look around for some Carbon manufactures/distributors and let you know what I found out.. I will also donate some ish for a mold for the interior..

 

Ok here's those fabric samples.
The top left is plain weave. It's not bad looking at all. But it lacks the flash of twill. The top middle fabric is twill. Thats the stuff I can't get wide enough. The top left is carbon/kevlar. Right underneath that is also carbon/kevlar. In the lower middle, the blue, is also carbon/kevlar. Then on the far left is texalium. It's silver fiberglass and makes a very attractive top layer. It's just fiberglass that was coated in aluminum. Texalium comes in pretty much any color. The Texalium is one solid color whereas the carbon/kevlar is black carbon interweaved with died kevlar. I don't have an example of kevlar here but it is yellow. Texalium would make a very good candidate for overlays because of the color choices and it's very attractive. Now keep in mind that none of the samples below are laminated. These are all dry fabric. Once laminated it adds depths and makes them a lot more attractive. So tell me what you think.

 

Hey J I like the plain weave, question you think you can make the interior part that goes for the inside of the T top you know where the handle is for the top. I believe its about a foot and a half long. Also if you can fabricate a ram air hood. Ill take one of your plain weave hoods. Also can you get me a price on that interior part. ty J

 

If I remember correctly from when I was looking at my ttops that piece doesnt actually have any brackets or anything for mounting right? It's just got holes and what not for screws and the handle part? If thats the case, and I'll get out there to look at it tomorrow (hopefully, I'm moving in tomorrow) and I'll let you know. As far as price goes, for both if they're as simple as I described in design, then it would probably run around $65.00 if I only made one set. If I were to get two people that wanted a set of those it would run around $53.00. If 5 people said they wanted a set of those it would only run about $46.00. Now to overlay the same part with carbon would run around or under $30.00 for the pair. By overlaying the original part in cf it will stiffen the original part so it's no flimsy and it would only add a negligeable amount of weight as not much material is added. And it you wouldn't be able to tell the difference between an overlay and a pure cf product by looking at it. No matter how closely you examined it (unless you look at the backside. Which will be out of sight when installed). So let me know which you prefer and once I get some sample products up you can let me know if you want me to make them still.

I can make the hood. Do you have any illustrations or examples of what you're looking for? See it doesn't cost me very much to make a plug. So if you were to provide me with an idea of what you wanted I could make a plug and paint it to match my car. Then I could post a pic of the hood and have people rate it. Not based on whether they would buy it, but if they just plain like the way it looks. Good reviews get good prices. Bad reviews get higher prices cause I get the idea nobody's gonna want to buy the design and I've gotta make my money back on the mold somehow. I think a ram air hood would look very good if done right though.

I'm gonna email the company about the plain weave and see what the deal is as far as if they're stocking it. If they are then I'll just use that to spit out a few hoods. Oh and just so you know, anything smaller than a hood I can make in twill.

 

Oh and by the way if anybody takes an idea from something somebody else has already done, please let me know who it was. If I end up making the part I'd kinda want to OK it with them first. I don't want people running around on the internet saying how I stole their idea Oh and I'm talking custom designs. Like certain styles of hood scoops or stuff like that. I don't care if someone's already made a carbon fiber hood. That's not gonna stop me.

 

Rock on J.

Here's one for ya in twill ... headlight buckets. I'm in desperate need of those bad boys, just no cash. I'd say within the next two to three months, I'll be able to buy a set off ya.

Oooh, also the door mirrors, yo ucould wrap those, correct? I'd dig that - only problem might be that I have a small chunk of material missing from my passenger side mirror, but it would take a little work and some fiberglass to fix.

Anywho, let me know what you think J.

-Dave-O

 

At 65 to 50 sounds pretty good price. As far as the hood is concerned im looking at a design like the viper hennesy from the DRFT showoff.http://www.autoimportcraze.com/cover...s_rsPhotos=218 the black viper hood thats what im looking for.

 

OH ****.. I want one of those J.. Also What about C/K black/gray?? I would be more interested in that than plain weave?? LMK

 

Holy Ishmael ... the Viper Competition Coupe hood is the SEX.

Yeah, J, let's work on a hood like that. I'm down for one.

 

so when can we start shipping you our interiors to get them coated in CF?


you wouldn't mind doing a few parts for my maxima as well would you? the maxi is going on a serious CF diet, i just ordered a CF trunklid to go with the hood

 

whats up with your web page?

 

The page is down for now..

 

I've been off line for a while do to the move. But I'm all settled in now. The phone was supposed to be turned on on the 1st but it didn't get done until today due to a problem with the outside line. There's always something. But as you can tell by me typing this, it's all working good. And the DSL is supposed to be here on the 11th. I'm excited about that one. I hate this dial up crap. It's alot faster here than it was in the old house though. I'm about 20Kb faster and still on dial up. ANyways I'll take your posts in order from since I've been offline.

D, the headlight buckets shouldn't be too tough. The mold would be tricky but not too bad. A wrap would be cake. They're already made out of fiberglass so weight savings would be minimal since they'd still have to be thick enough to align with the rest of the body panels. And wrapping mirrors would also be cake. I can fix any imperfections. Or you could do it before you send them out if you wanted. It's no big deal. Even if they were cracked I could still make em work

Zskyline, you're talking about Tarzan's viper? That one looks a little tricky but it's definitely doable. And remember guys, I can make anything in fiberglass. It doesn't have the limitations of CF. For one, it conforms much more easily than CF and two, I don't have to get a cosmetically pleasing fiberglass since it gets painted anyways. And fiberglass is cheap

Oh, and Hubinette is drifting a Viper too. 'cept his is white/blue cause of his Mopar sponsorship.

s/c, as far as that color combination of cf/kevlar fabric, let me know if you know where to get it. I know it can be dyed any color but finding someone who's dyeing it that color is the tough part. I haven't seen it yet but I'm also not puttin too much toward looking for different color CF/Kevlar fabrics. So if you know let me know.

007, as far as shipping your interior parts goes, soon. See here's the problem. I've got everything now but carbon fiber fabric and my damn air compressor. I ordered the compressor a while back but it's on back order. And it's still on back order. I need the compressor in order to be able to spray the gel coats and clear coats. Now overlays can be done without spraying the gel coat. It can be brushed on since the surface has to be worked extensively anyways. The clear coat is just for extra shine. So if you can do without the clearcoat (or even want to do it yourself) then I can order CF as soon as the 15th of this month. I still have no source for 60" CF yet for hoods though. And as far as the Maxima goes, are you just talking about interior parts? I'm just assuming that since there are plenty of CF hoods already on the market. If so then yeah, I could churn a few out for you. And if you like what you get, let people know.

drifter, just like s/c said, it's down for now. It should be back up before the end of this month and with products and stuff on it too. I say should, so don't hold you breath just yet because I've had plenty of stuff go wrong already. But if all goes well then it will definitely be back up before December.

If there is anything else, just let me know. 007, I'm gonna PM you.

 

I will look.. I have 3 weeks off now NO WORK

 

Lucky bastard

Anyways, I may have scored some good news for you hood cravers. I got a tip tonight about a place that carries the twill in 60" widths. Their site however does not give any information about whether it's available or what the pricing is. I inquired with them and as soon as I hear from them I'll let you guys know. I also have a very small amount of fabrics coming to me. It should be here soon. I'll be making some small parts from these. If everyone likes what they see and I can secure some 60" carbon I'll start making hoods for anybody who wants one immediately. Otherwise they'll have to run the risk of there not being enough carbon for me to make them. I'll let you guys know, and then you can let me know. As long as I can get a couple people to trust me with deposits I can get enough hoods rolled out to satisfy who ever wants one now. Remember though, this is only if this supplier actually has it in stock.

Now, a little news for those on a budget. Interior parts like pillar panels and what not are extremely light. Making a replacement panel out of CF would only save a few precious ounces. So an interior carbon piece would be a strictly cosmetic piece. With that being said, overlays are far, far, far cheaper than a pure carbon piece. An overlay wouldn't add enough weight to a panel to even be able to feel the difference if you held the two in your hands. That to me is reason enough to overlay interior parts instead of having them completely crafted out of carbon. Of course if you really want pure carbon, I'll be able to do that too. But I can start doing overlays this month!

Now for those who are really on a budget: There is an alternative to carbon fiber. It's called Texalium. You'll see it in the pic above in silver. This stuff comes in black now as well. It looks identicle to carbon fiber. YOU CAN NOT TELL THE DIFFERENCE BY LOOKING AT IT!!! So for interior overlays, this would be the best material. Plus you could always lie and say it's carbon and nobody would ever know the difference. The only difference lies in its strength. It has the pysical properties of fiberglass (cause that's basically what it is ) and it doesn't weigh any more than CF does. And since in an overlay only minimal material is used, there would be no difference in weight from a carbon overlayed part. This stuff can also be used to make parts.A texalium part would weigh as much as a fiberglass part but would look like a carbon fiber part. It's your guys' call though. Lightweight = higher price. Higher weight = lower price (a lot lower )

I only mention all this because carbon is getting really hard to come by and because of this it's also becoming more expensive. Mean while the Texalium can be had for the price of fiberglass. Oh and I've got some pics of colored Texalium I'm going to post here in the next few moments. I'm going to try to get some pics of black texalium as well so you can see that it really does look just like carbon.
If anyones got any questions on all of this just let me know and I'm happy to answer them.

OH and I'm also going to be making carbon fiber radio plates here soon too. So if anyone's gonna be interested in those then let me know.