The epic saga continues!
Well I though I was going to Lowes last night to buy materials for my fiberglass seat build on my motorcycle.
Unfortunately, they didn't really have much. Some fiberglass mat, and some Bondo fiberglass polyester resin.
From what I've been reading I need mat, chopped strand mat, and woven roving (for added strength). Cheap resin will work my newbie learning.
Should I just buy this stuff from Amazon?
Do you have a marine supply store in the area?
West Marine stores if you have one near.
Defender http://www.defender.com/ if you mail order.
Fiberglast isn't the cheapest, but they're good.
Your local West Marine store has some stuff but it's expensive.
Advance Auto Parts carries basic pre-packaged cloth and mat and quarts of resin.
A consideration is good vs. not-good materials and what it does for your learning curve. I've been dicking around w/ composites for 40 years, and have had a fair amount of professional experience. I found I learned more and got better experience when I committed the funds and resources to doing it right.
I was making carbon fiber/urethane foam/maple/S glass/epoxy laminate slalom racing skateboards for a couple years. I probably spent $500 all in on materials and fixtures and bagging supplies and made a dozen decks, which sell in the neighborhood of $200/ea.
I've just started fiberglass repair on Dr.Linda's Europa. I went to an actual automotive paint (only) store and bought some matt, cloth and a gallon of resin. I had some of the LowesDepot stuff that I finished up. The professional stuff, Evercoat, I think, seems to wet out the mat easier. Europas are polyester resin, so that's what my repairs are.
I have a piece of carbon fiber honeycomb coming for the firewall, to replace the cardboard OEM one.
I've got a West Marine dealer near me.
Here's the calculations I've done:
The area I'm working with is 10" x 27" thats 270 square inches.
I did some shopping on US Composites and came up with this:
Total: $46.30 Shipping: $16.00
That seems like I'm spending way more than I have to for the job I'm working with. Even if I were to do 4 layers, that still under 1,500 square inches.
It's my understanding that roving and especially biaxial really increase the strength of the piece. Since what I'm building will be supported by the frame of my motorcycle, strength, at least in this "intro" project won't be that important.
pretty great site - not the prettiest, but tons of offerings and prices seem pretty good - I havent compared though to be honest...
Not to stop you in anyway but do you have a design for the seat yet? Theres tons of off the shelf seat bases out there. The cafe crazy has brought back alot of small time outfits again.
You don't need anything more than what you've already got. Sure, you can make a strong seat with other glasses, and you can perhaps make it lighter and spiffier. But you don't actually need it.
I do.
It's not like anything on the market.
Most pans either utilize the factory hinges and locking plate, and therefore are actually raised above the frame and use rubber stoppers as support.
Others involve removing those factory hinges and locking plates for fitment reason.
The reason I'm making mine out of fiberglass is that it will flow around those hinges and locking plate, and conform to the frame, using it as support.
foxtrapper wrote: You don't *need* anything more than what you've already got. Sure, you can make a strong seat with other glasses, and you can perhaps make it lighter and spiffier. But you don't actually *need* it.
What are we talking about here? The fiberglass that I selected from US Composites?
Your saying I could go with just straight chopped strand mat?
Don't think of composite materials on the basis of "exactly how much material will be contained in this seat pan". A man could never own a regular fractional/letter/number set of 115 drills that way - too many would be surplus.
Composite materials - particularly once you have some notion of what you're doing - are another arrow in your quiver. I've got on hand - and have used in the past few months- 5 or so types of E and S glass cloth, mat, roving, bi-axial and bi-directional tape, polyester and vinylester resin, West System epoxy, peel ply, bleeder ply, bagging film and the fluffy stuff you put underneath so it maintains vacuum.
Composite materials are like fasteners, materials or welding wire. get extra, keep it on hand, play, create, find uses.
The entire Europa body was made with chopped strand mat. It's plenty strong. You're making a seat pan. I think 3 layers would be plenty.
