Laminating Carbon cloth? ( kit car dash )

[W.olly]

Hi all hope you all well for the new year and had a good xmas, not long before xmas i got myself a new toy



Now i have near doen a new dash for it as the old was not to my liking so i have made a new one from MDF as the backing, yes i was going to go with the polyurethane sheets and laminate that way but i am on a rather low budget so this is the cheap way, and will be good, i hope when it is done, it will be fully sealed.

Now this is the dash nearly done





Now the plan is to cover it with Carbon cloth, the twill weave type, i have dome a fair bit of laminating with standard CSM but never Carbon cloth, would it be ok to go with 1 single 200grm layer of carbon or a layer of woven fibreglass first onto the MDF?

all best
wolly

 

[711jrp]

I would use body filler to get the panel smooth and hide the captive nuts ( it flats down nice on mdf) Then go straight to the carbon. Have a look here at the bottom of the page there is some informative articles.

http://www.carbonmods.co.uk/Default.aspx

 

[W.olly]

lol mate, yes will be smoothed out, still bits to do yet which will be done this week, i will look at the link, thanks kida.

 

[madkayaker]

I would use body filler to get the panel smooth and hide the captive nuts ( it flats down nice on mdf) Then go straight to the carbon. Have a look here at the bottom of the page there is some informative articles.

http://www.carbonmods.co.uk/Default.aspx

Your company per chance?

 

[711jrp]

No mate, it does look like it with just the one post lol. I registered just before Christmas looking for some info on which new tig to go for.The forum has already saved me from some Chinese cheapies so I thought it was fair to put something back.

Pete

 

[madkayaker]

That's ok then it has happened before often with people trying to sell substandard (often Chinese) rubbish. The carbon site does look good

 

[W.olly]

Does Carbon need the epoxy resin or can poly be used?

 

[711jrp]

Poly is fine as long as it's not structural and polishes up better or that should be easier. Air bubbles are your enemy stir it slowly

@madkayaker that's fine I understand.

 

[W.olly]

Poly is fine as long as it's not structural and polishes up better or that should be easier. Air bubbles are your enemy stir it slowly

@madkayaker that's fine I understand.

Nice one, thanks for that, the plan is just as CSM, poly resin on base, Carbon cloth wet out then tacky and wet out with top coat, but if not and i mess up the shine then polish up and spray lacquer on top.

I like the adhesive carbon but my god the price lol.

 

[711jrp]

That should work fine. Just on another note the dash might look a bit less boxy if these corners had a bigger radius on them.

 

[W.olly]

That should work fine. Just on another note the dash might look a bit less boxy if these corners had a bigger radius on them.

Like said mate, not done yet, even the clock aperture needs the corners doing, they were ok untill i got carried away with the router, you can just see the cock pod behind the dash, thats the radius it should be, going to get some filler etc and sort it this week.

 

[Wendelspanswick]

you can just see the cock pod behind the dash

Now that is just perverted!

Is that the new offering from Apple? I heard sales of the I Pod were falling but a Cock Pod!!!

 

[BeeJay99]

Is that a Dutton Melos?

 

[RichardM]

mdf / filler may show through the weave for a single layer, especially when deforming for the edges, hairspray is good to stop it fraying for a bit. Polyester will do it but if you're going to spend the money on carbon cloth may get better results using epoxy resin then have it sprayed with 2K lacquer.

 

[W.olly]

Yes BeeJay it is

I have seen the carbon base coat resin on the link above, so i could use that if i find anything will show through, its not a big expense for the carbon, only about £20 which isnt much for this. As its really a flat smallish panel it will polish up well with a good topcoat, then maybe a spray up.

 

[DrNik]

See if you can get some black pigment and paint on a coat of black resin straight on to the mdf, when this gets tacky, not wet enough to come off on your fingers but not dry either, lay your carbon cloth on smoothing all the air out and getting the weave uniform, this can then dry, I'd advise using a proper polyurethane resin, it's cheap enough, the brush it on slowly, it will drip like crazy but don't worry use a ribbed roller to get the carbon "wet", let it dry and do a further coat even 2 them when hard you can flat it off in ever finer sand paper, till its just dull, the spray with lacquer, job done , I did a smart car chair, for a friend and it looked a million dollars, ps the odd pin hole will fill with lacquer so don't worry

 

[W.olly]

Ok, job done, not as good as i wanted but it will do, and what a stress to get the weave inline and cover the edges and front etc all within 25mins, got 650g twill weave, bit thick for forming around the gauge apertures, so i made a stainless steel gauge cover which i will be polishing up this week.
I had to do 2 coats of flowcoat as the first set very fats and left serious brush strokes. I sanded back the first coat good time to hope the second has adheard enough,some say you can only do one coat of flowcoat and some say you can do more if you sand back enough, we will see.

Now i need to polish it back, i have been looking for polishing compounds but they are a bit expensive, i was thinking about 1200 wet n dry and maybe 1500 wet n dry.

any suggestions on what to polish it up with?

cheers

wolly

 

[DrNik]

You'll be there forever with 1500 or 1200. I'd go for 800 grit and then a flash over with some cellulose laquer to make life a lot easier. It will fill the pinholes that will drive you crazy.

 

[Coo]

Pics please we love pics !

 

[W.olly]

Welllll, its looking good know, i am just adding a few coats of laquer to make lide easy and cheaper lol.

I sanded it back with 240 and 1200, was easy and not as ridged as i thought.





After a sanding down



This is the new gauge facia, as said now stainless and will be polished up



I cut out all the holes





So just waiting for the second coat of laqure to tacky up then third coat and jobs done.