What kind of matting, resin, etc. should I got for doing repair and minor fabrication on the body panels?
And where should I buy it from?
Visit our community sponsor
What kind of matting, resin, etc. should I got for doing repair and minor fabrication on the body panels?
And where should I buy it from?
P.S. I also need to fill a couple spots that look like there were air bubbles in the original molding, what's the best material to fill those in with?
DND,
The Factory Five bodies are made using Vinyl-Ester Resin.
Regular chop mat will be a good choice for your cloth which can be purchased just about anywhere.
Regard the air bubble holes, I think most folks use Evercoat Rage Gold to fill imperfections when doing the bodywork.
Steve
You can get both at Home Depot.
I'm pretty sure that the home Depot resin is a polyester resin. Not really suitable for structural projects. Here's a link to some definitions of the three types of resins...
http://www.sollercomposites.com/epoxyresinchoice.html
I've used the West Marine products with good results. If you have one near you, that's probably going to be the easiest resource.
As far as epoxy vs polyester. I'm no expert, but I can tell you what I've found in my own research:
Epoxy is more expensive than polyester, but supposedly bonds better to both cured polyester and cured epoxy fiberglass. I've done some adhesion tests with the West System epoxy fiberglass resin and some of their fillers. You can find a little more info on my build thread. The epoxy resin bonds pretty well to the FFR body panels, but it does not bond stronger than the already-cured polyester resin. In other words, if you lay epoxy-based fiberglass on the already-cured polyester fiberglass and bend the joint to failure, it will fail along the bond line between the two materials - at least it did in my tests. I have not tested a polyester resin's bonding strength to already-cured fiberglass, but from what I've read it will not be as good as epoxy. Don't get me wrong, the epoxy bond is very strong, and I bonded my two engine cover pieces together with good results.
The one West System product I've been super impressed with is the Six10 adhesive. It's a 2-part epoxy, and in my tests, once bonded to a properly prepared surface (roughened with 32-grit sandpaper and dust-free), the base polyester fiberglass failed before the epoxy bond did. You can bond metal and other materials with it too. It is much much stronger than the Evercoat Maxim Multi-Panel adhesive I tested.
All my tests were done on scrap strips of fiberglass I cut off of the 818 body panels during my body modifications.
Another nice benefit is the epoxy resin's fumes are much less potent than polyester. I used polyester resin once before, and you absolutely must use a full respirator capable of filtering the fumes. The epoxy resin is much better to work with, IMO.
I don't recommend using dissimilar materials. I get my Vinyl ester resin from US Composites:
http://www.uscomposites.com/polyesters.html
Without seeing the "spots that look like there were air bubbles" I can't know if they are only in the gelcoat or into the glass. If you need to fill structural defects 3M High Strength Repair Filler is usually the product of choice.
https://www.3m.com/3M/en_US/company-...3087022&rt=rud
Jeff
My boat guys back home (Florida) agree with everything in the last two posts. And given a choice...always repair with the same material the panels were made from. One of them also added that the panels on a car, like this one, aren't subjected to the same types of stress that a boat is since the panels just hang there, and I'll likely never have any issues with integrity if I absolutely have to be a cheap fool and use up whatever dissimilar materials I have laying around. I guess my friends know me pretty well, lol. Fortunately, I don't have any materials at all laying around (well, at least not enough that I'd feel bad not using it) since I haven't started body work. As far as structural integrity goes, they were incredulous about any sort needed for these panels, since they build/repair stuff that people have to stand on. I did build a fiberglass tortoise cave out of the cheap stuff, and I'm pretty sure I could stand on that...much thinner than a Factory Five panel (although much smaller and better shaped for supporting a person, too).
No real reason to post these except to show the size, and that my sweet baby girl likes to help build stuff, too, lol. Maybe they're entertaining at least?
Tortise cave cured.jpg
tortise cave finished.jpg
Last edited by turbomacncheese; 08-04-2018 at 11:57 AM.
FWIW I used epoxy to widebody my car. Bond seems solid, panels have been flexed plenty without issue. My build is in my attached garage and I have kids, fumes were not an option, so it was epoxy or nothing.
Adam _____ Instagram @PopesProjects____ YouTube Channel
818 SRX - #91
Arrived 01/02/2014
First Start 10/31/2016
First Drive 05/22/2017
Registered 10/25/2019 BRAP818