I have a NASCAR Car of Tomorrow Wing on my Fiero track car. When I first purchased the wing I noticed it had some faded / cloudy areas, which I polished in an attempt to make the wing look more uniform. That was about 6 months ago. Now it's apparent that the clearcoat/gelcoat/epoxy is completely gone. When I wash the wing, it smells funny. Looking from a low angle I can see the texture of the carbon on the top surface where it's been exposed to the sun. There is no coating left on top. The bottom side is still glossy. Obviously UV protection was lacking from the original finish and it has fully degraded by this point in time.
What can I refinish the wing with to get it back to a nice, pretty, protected state?
I have been playing with carbonfibre with my sailboat. I have been using plain old resin made for glassfibre.
Spray it with a couple coats of automotive clearcoat, Shiny, better UV protection.
+1 for UV-resistant clear coat.
The resin will work too, but it's more work to make it look nice (and nastier to work with).
What kind of prep should I do to get the clear coat to stick? Or is it just fine to apply it over the dry carbon / whats left of the resin?
Actually I was looking for what kind of prep to do and found that you should use resin and not clearcoat over any exposed CF, because the solvents in the clear coat could degrade it. Once that's covered up, you should give it a light sanding and cleaning and spray the clear.
give it a light sanding and cleaning and spray the clear.
what grit and what kind of clear? clean w/acetone or mineral spirits or...? would Krylon uv-resist in a rattle can suffice?
not to hijack but I have a new cf hood vent(Carbontrix) to install, it is well coated but my car lives outside 100% of the time. AZ sunshine absolutely destroys everything - any additional protection I can give it would be great.
Hey just checked back on this thread and saw your question. I'd sand it with the finest grit you have the patience for. Start with something like 400 and move down if it's not doing the job. I'd clean with just mineral spirits.
Krylon UV-resist is good enough, but if you want hardcore protection and you're OK with losing the look, you might want to use plasti-dip/elasti-wrap. That will keep the hood like new underneath, and you always have the option of peeling it off.
I thought I recognized the fiero that Matt Farah drove as being someone on here.
Is there any method for repairing cosmetic stress cracks in the clear coat over carbon?
did a bunch of searching and found this informative post on DIY cf refurbish:
http://www.team-integra.net/forum/2829594-post12.html
moparman76_69 wrote:
I thought I recognized the fiero that Matt Farah drove as being someone on here.
impulsive wrote:
did a bunch of searching and found this informative post on DIY cf refurbish:
http://www.team-integra.net/forum/2829594-post12.html
Based on the pics in that thread, the process did not work very well... I want to get a nice gloss finish again, not an art-and-craft store rattle can haze.
I'd try to contact Crawford Composites. They're the ones that made the wing in the first place.
In reply to series8217:
I saw his instagram post of the car and thought the COT wing and brackets looked familiar. I just watched the short video and I'll see the long one when I pony up for a Drive sub through Vimeo.
Keith Tanner wrote:
I'd try to contact Crawford Composites. They're the ones that made the wing in the first place.
Uhhhhh derp, yeah why didn't I think of that one? Email sent.
Crawford Composites replied and said to have the wing clear-coated.
