Ok I wanted to get a little more in-depth on what I do when fabricating. I wish I would have done this with all my other mods, but oh well
Here is a little fiberglassing 101 for you guys and gals that don't know how to use the stuff.
First of all I wanted a new steering wheel and could not find one that would fit, looks wise. That is until I saw a local guy selling a stock wheel from a 00-03 Celica, I loved it for the most part. It was aggressive, yet it didn't look like an aftermarket bolt on
uke: Only thing I didn't really care for was the center toyo emblem, it looked too "cheap" and plasticy.
Here is a pic of the 00-03 wheel:
Well he wanted around $400 for it, and all the ones on ebay were $400-$600 (because it has an air bag I guess). Well I found one on Ebay with a blown bag, "Buy it Now" was $39. So I bought it thinking I could repair the center "skin", seeing as my car is a Non-Airbag car. Sadly he did not send the center section with the wheel, so now what? Make my own :icon_razz
This is a good thing as I could do away with that cheap looking emblem.
So first thing was to make a
Plug ( a "plug" is formed piece that you want to replicate in fiberglass and what you make the mold off of). In this case I used green florist foam. There are 2 different kinds of florist foam, one hold up to resins the other will NOT. Do not use the stuff labled as "styrofoam", it doesn't look like typical white bead-styrofoam, but it "melts" from resin the same way. What you want is called Dry Foam, it is a dense foam and holds up to resins and fillers. Be careful with it though, it is very "soft" as in, it will indent very easily. It is so soft you can actually sand it with just your finger.
So here is the pics of the proses. Sorry for the first few pics being so poor. I had to take them with a web cam, as my digicam was away from me for a few days. The plug was formed to the shape I wanted and then filed, sanded, and primed.
The most important part is the plug, it must be exactly the way you want the fiberglass piece to be.
Now that the plug is done it is time to actually make the mold. On this project I used "Bondo Hair", it is not actually bondo, it is a resin jelly with chopped up fiberglass mixed in. It cures very strong and is great for small molds like this one. (larger molds will topically be made with fiberglass and resin). *Fist thing is to coat the plug in a mold release wax, a MUST*
Then I just mixed up the bondo hair and gooped it on the plug, making sure to work out all the air so there are no voids in the mold.
Once this has set up, just flip it over and break out all the foam and clean off anything left from the plug.
Now time to prep the mold. Just make sure there are no air pockets or voids, all imperfections are just filled, sanded, and then the mold gets painted.
Now just wax the mold the same way as on the plug. Cut the fiberglass down into usable strips and pieces. Mix up the resin, and have fun, again MAKE SURE to work out the air (this is where a vacuum bagging set-up comes in and makes life a little easer,...but I no have one) Don't pass out from the fumes :icon_razz
Once this sets up, cut off some of the excess glass to make it easier to get to the edges to pop out the piece. (on this small of a piece I just used a flat head screw driver to "wedge" between the mold and the glass. POP
Then just trim off all the rest of the excess.
