Carbon fiber trim progress.

[metaphysico]

Well today is drift and tomorrow im off so I will get back to it tomorrow. I screwed up the mold some yesterday, didn't put any release agent down and the part stuck to the mold so I bent it some taking the last part out. Not all for the bad, I am gonna make a new mold just need someone with a metal break that is strong enough. Anyways because I have to redo the mold anyways I am gonna remake it somewhat and make the curves more pronounced not much more it will just resemble the factor a little more, and the trim will be flush with sides of the car. With the new mold I will be able to make trim that is the same size as stock too, for hers we are recessing it. Also gotta get some mold release wax today.
So anyway since its my wifes car I gave her a spec sheet I made for the mold and I am having her track down a place to bend the mold and find the release wax so hopefully she can get all that. If she can I am gonna get 2 molds and be able to make her whole trim kit tomorrow, I am restarting it from scratch. I will also make a few black pieces to see how they look and to show people. The first window vent mold is almost done just a little more sanding and a final smoothing layer. So I should be able to get some of those done, but the mold is not very strong so I dont know how many sets I will be able to make before destroying the mold.
Tomorrow night should yield a lot of pictures and a mostly if not fully completed kit.

 

[Orion ZyGarian]

I likes what I sees!

 

[metaphysico]

Well I got the pre molds done last night, but it took me a lot longer than I though it would. The coating I put on the molds turned out a lot more rough then I would have liked so there will be some sanding and another coat getting done tonight, so that really sets me back, I was hoping to have the kit setting up last night and do trimming and fitting today but now I dont know if I will even get the parts in the molds tonight. Gonna do the next seal coat with more activator so I can get it to set up faster to that might buy me some time. I am hoping I can get at least one mold ready to go tonight and hopefully two of them ready. I am going to try to make 3 parts before setting up for the full set, one the blue black hybrid fiber for my wifes car, one pure black cf, and one silver kevlar, the later two being test pieces. Everything will be going smooth and fast once I get the molds finalized.

 

[bombinuass]

if you want to use my car since its white as a test car then thats cool. you know im missing a trim piece anyway. pics would turn out better. ive seen his trim pcs in person the pics dont do it any justice. the CF trim looks GREAT!.

 

[t87supra]

So anyway since its my wifes car I gave her a spec sheet I made for the mold and I am having her track down a place to bend the mold and find the release wax so hopefully she can get all that. If she can I am gonna get 2 molds and be able to make her whole trim kit tomorrow, I am restarting it from scratch. I will also make a few black pieces to see how they look and to show people. The first window vent mold is almost done just a little more sanding and a final smoothing layer. So I should be able to get some of those done, but the mold is not very strong so I dont know how many sets I will be able to make before destroying the mold.
Tomorrow night should yield a lot of pictures and a mostly if not fully completed kit.

What are you using for your release wax? We usually use some cheap hair spray from Walmart. It goes on real easy, works well, and is quick and easy to find. I definitely prefer it over the wax we used to use. Your mold might be tighter than our stuff though, so I'm not sure how well it will work for this.

 

[metaphysico]

I use johnsons paste wax, it works well. Its carnuba and some other waxes in a paste form, i think kerosene makes it a paste. Anyways you rub it on and wait for it to dry into a full wax then you can polish the wax to a shine, works very well and gives a very smooth finish. I made two black cf trim pieces yesterday, have to polish them, but one was done with the old mold one with the new. I did a wet lay of them to test the wax. I coated the molds in around 1/8th inch of resin so they are pretty strong.
I would have gotten further on them, but I stole my wifes battery and put it into my car and started it up since it has not been run for a long time. Well after hearing it run again I decided I miss my car and its killing me not to drive it, so I spent the rest of the night last night doing body work on my car. I am on vacation all of next week so I should be able to get my car street legal again (ie all the lights back on it) and I am gonna do the rest of the body work while its driveable. So for now I am going to spend some time on my car getting it ready to drive. There is not much left, and I will sand and polish the parts tonight so I can get a pic of the black cf on the car hopefully tonight. They ended up with some air bubbles because I did not want to use a heat gun, due to the fact I dont know what that will do to the wax.
On another note, I am not sure if I want to do any vacuum infusion parts because that leaves very little resin on the front of the part so it does not have a good finish. And when I went back to try to add a layer of resin over the top for a finish step it turned out very rough, the resin did not lay as flat as I though it would, and the stuff is really hard to sand. So I may end up sticking with the wet lay I have been doing It will just mean I have to be more careful when doing the parts so they are level in the resin and I dont get air bubbles.

 

[bombinuass]

any update? ill probly be over tomorrow night (wed). i need to calibrate my TPS.

 

[supraguy@aol]

Looks good, man.

 

[metaphysico]

Sorry guys but progress has been slowed due to the fact god hates me. I had to replace the valve seals in my wifes car and while doing it my compressor decided to die so i switched to my backup compressor and then it went out. Lost a piston in one and stripped the drive shaft in the other one so that lost me a day of work. Now the trans in her car wont come out of second gear so i am gonna have to swap the trans to her original trans but that means pulling the transmissions in both car. Damn i really need to get a lift installed in my shop at my house. So progress should pickup on the cf soon. I am gonna try to get two of the templates set tomorrow so i should have one black door piece and one blue one done tomorrow. While they setup i am gonna work on doing the trans swap. Sorry for the jumbled mess of this text this is on my cellphone and hard to format on.