Carbon Fiber Products

[kulluminati777]

I know there is someone on this website who knows a guy who knows a guy who lives next to a guy that can fabricate carbon fiber stuff, so lets get on it already.

How hard is it to make carbon fiber things like wings hoods ect. I was thinking of getting in to making mazdaspeed wings,bumpers and skirts out of carbon fiber then maybe move to doors, hatches and front side panels

[youdirtyfox]

Really the only big weight saving to have made from CF is doors and you can imagine how big a job that is?!
wings and bonnets really don't weigh that much

If you want to learn then yeah go for it there are loads of sites that can help, but you may want to start with fibreglass lay up
before you move onto the real expense of CF

[Nd4SpdSe]

I wanted to make a CF MS bumper and fenders

I seriously looked into it when things were good and was quoted $1500 for the fenders, and that would include me owning the mold...

[Ryan]

Retardedly expensive.

A roll of CF is worth over $2000 alone. Good, symmetrical molds must be CNC machined, which means you need an accurate model, and a CNC with a big enough bed to do it in a reasonable number of pieces.

[wytbishop]

Retardedly expensive.

A roll of CF is worth over $2000 alone. Good, symmetrical molds must be CNC machined, which means you need an accurate model, and a CNC with a big enough bed to do it in a reasonable number of pieces.

There are countless examples of people doing projects like fenders and much more complex things than that without the use o CNC machines or any other multi million dollar machinery.

I know that you speak from a position of experience Ryan, but I was also enrolled in the Engineering faculty of a major university and I was also taught that the only way to do anything is the way they teach you to do it. The truth is that the only people who are doing things the way they teach it in school is the people who have multi million dollar budgets and armies of minions. In the real world those people make up a small fraction of all the people who are manufacturing stuff....really cool stuff.

That's not to say that Ryan's wrong...he's not. But he is looking at things like this through a very narrow scope. There are ways to do things like this. Get creative, try stuff, but be thoughtful...don't toss a huge amount of money away on something that you aren't sure about or an experiment.

[Evo_Spec]

i could have sworn this came up not too long ago and people gave awesome awesome links, one of which i think was a guy who made all CF panels for his...mustang?

[Ryan]

I'm speaking from an industry point of view.

Yes, you could make one off parts in your garage for a fraction of the cost, but the quality/effort line is exponential.

Either you have time, or you have money. That applies to almost every project.

the OP was talking about wingS and hoodS. These require reusable molds, unless you plan to only make two per year.

Any carbon fibre product requires strict quality control in order to not turn out shitty. They don't teach me this in school, I do this extra curricular.

I have been workign close alongside these projects this year:

This is a two part female mold for our steering wheel. The molds are CNC machined from what would be an affordable chunk of renboard. The halves must be a perfect match in order to bond them together.



this is the procedure for the creation of our sidepods. a cnc'd foam male mold, a female FG mold, and then the final carbon part. Dozens of hours are required to get a decent finish. In the end, we'll paint it anyway. The curvature is enough that you need relief cuts, which would make the expose weave look shitty, no matter how smooth and glossy you got it.


That is actually me, working on our intake. The molds were made on a rapid prototyping machine that uses a water dissolvable autoclave-able mold material necessary for the geometry. The material costs $100/kg, which isn't too bad.






I don't get any marks for any of this, no professor is leading it. We build this car one off, from our designs, and our effort to gain access to sponsored materials and sponsored labour. These types or procedures is what you would be looking at doing unless you have years to burn. We also have a small army of hands (20+) and a budget that has exceeded 60k some years.

So if you feel comfortable telling me I have a 'narrow' view on things when the extent of your experience is perhaps internet research or phone calls....

[wytbishop]

Look around the industry Ryan...and not just at Seibon or Penske...look at what regular people are doing.

You can't make blanket statements based on what "Industry" says is possible or advisable. That is the epidemic that infects Engineers. I know because I was right where you are 14 years ago. If you're lucky you will graduate and get a great job at a big company with huge resources and you'll get to do things the way school told you is the best way to do them. But most Mech. Eng. grads get jobs in oil companies and other multinational corporations where engineering is the support that drives the business they get paid for and perform the mundane for a living while they work on their passion in their garages.

That is my life. I know exactly what is going on in your head when you talk about this stuff because I had all the same thoughts back when I thought I was going to spend 30 years designing the coolest s--- ever. Now I design educational material for people who are just smart enough to run the machines but not smart enough to understand how the machines work and design cars on my own time and figure out ways to make the really cool stuff in my head in a garage...just like a million other Engineers and Technologists out there who don't work for NASA.

Like I said Ryan. You're not wrong, but you aren't looking at the whole picture.

[Ryan]

I completely do not understand.

Am I being overly ignorant of something? I HAVE DONE THESE THINGS. I know what sort of difficulties arise, and I tell you that your car will not have Zonda quality CF work, but you just shrug it off.

If experience isn't enough for you, what do you want? magic?


I have no desire to build rocket ships or pioneer human development. I don't have the GPA or the desire for it. I rock a solid 2.5-3 and spend more time with tools in my hands than books. Look at what I drive. I'm a little offended you make these presumptions about me. My ideal job actually involves me working on the floor alongside machinists and technologists. I want to make engine mounts and crossmembers and maybe engines for Kia or Audi, I don't care.

Some of the people I work with, though, are exactly what you describe. It boggles my mind that 95% of mech eng students don't even do their own oil changes. They do silly s--- like use crescent wrenches, too. Don't know how to work a screwdriver, even. Sad, but true.

I've worked in construction jobs since I was 13. I'm doing it again this year, I'm building a cottage this summer. I actually avoided getting an 'engineering job' that would make me a little tag along at Boeing, getting mediocre pay, and basically playing solitaire all day.

I am definitely within the top 5% of most practical engineering students in my faculty. I am totally aware of the problems you present, but I am still confident about this carbon thing. Pretend I'm not an engineering student, and look at some of the stuff I'm working on. Does that change your mind? Is my opinion worth more then? Maybe I'm not the one with the stigma.


I feel like you've got this idea stuck in your head that you dug up from the one corner of the internet that supported your sliver of hope, and when someone contradicts it, they're wrong because you found one example somewhere of it.

I understand it happens, and I hope you are successful with your project, but in my experience, it will overwhelm you, and in the end, with the techniques you allude to, it will not come out according to plan.

[wytbishop]

I'm not trying to say anything negative about you Ryan. I have a lot of respect for what you're doing and the experiences you've had. I know that from the perspective of "best practices" you are absolutely right. Carbon fiber parts are not easy to make. And yet I can find a hundred examples of good quality CF parts being made by do it yourselfers. There's a guy in my own city who has made a small but sustainable business out of it.

I have seen examples of beautiful parts that have been hand crafted without the use of any advanced technology. It can be done and I'm going to try it. Maybe it will work, maybe I'll fail miserably and look like a nitwit.

I didn't mean to offend you or insult you. I really do envy you more than you know. I wish I could go back in time with what I know now and try it again.

[_-Night-Shade-_]

Wytbishop has seen the light!!!

[Josh]

all in all it really depends on what the part is for. looks or function.

I have made many FG one offs but it was all for looks, it takes a bit to make some functional strength parts out of CF. I completely agree with Ryan on this. Not saying you cant do it in your garage because YOU CAN to some extent. but will you have the reliability and consistency within the product that you would if it were done in a proper environment, no probably not. again if it is parts for looks not really a problem at all.

BTW Ryan, What did you use to cover the foam with to make a proper mold? I have found that the resigns melt the foam, so I have gone as far as covering them with foil or plastic.

I hart dry CF products

[kulluminati777]

Wytbishop has seen the light!!!

[Ryan]

Well... all I can say is, good luck. I'll eat my hat if you make anything you can sell for less than it would cost you to have it made.

Thats a lie, thats the only nice thing I can say.

Go tell Oscar that his industry could be had out in your garage easily. Since I don't count.

http://imgur.com/gallery/MbHp6

[wytbishop]

I will promise you this Ryan. If the day comes that I have tried and totally failed I will post for all the world that you were absolutely right.

But I'm going to try and there isn't much I can't figure out a way to do.