Nose job

[Simon]

As I'm in the process of fitting my front clip to my car, I thought I'd like to make the front nostril vents (twin vents) slightly deeper and possibly wider to help with the throughput of air through the radiator.
I've seen it done on several other cars and while I'm sure somebody could offer me a twin nostril panel with deeper vent, I'd like to know if it's possible to do it myself.
I have a rudimentary knowledge of fiberglass techniques (i.e. basic) but wouldn't know where to start.
Is this something I could do myself?
Thanks

Simon

[Lynn]

Simon,

The way I've seen it done looked pretty straight forward. You can mock it up from topside using very thin metal sheets. You need to pay more attention to not marring the underside though. Because once you get it pretty much like you want it (you'll have to ignore the step up from the existing fiberglass to the metal when looking at the right side), you will turn it upside down, apply mold release to the metal underside: apply wax or spray it with PVA. I prefer PVA but be careful not to get it on the existing fibreglass. It is alcohol/water soluble, so clean up isn't too bad. Which one to use? wax gives a slicker finish, but you tend to get more missed spots which can be a pain in the arse when it sticks. PVA tends to leave a matte or semi-gloss look, but tends to relase much better. (Less is more with PVA also: don't apply any one coat to heavy or it can sag and give you an ugly finish. If you need to smooth transitions or create fillets, use some bondo and get it as smooth as possible before applying your mold release. Fillets will also make the release much easier. Most of this is straight and flat making it much easier. Only the floors of the nostrils has much curve.

But, do be careful of compound curves that can lock the backing mold in place. Some areas will have to be given fillets afterwards to look smooth; getting crisp outside corners can be another pain in the arse because the matt will want to raise up and bubble rather than staying flat against the outside 90º. One way to deal with this is to have your main wall sheets come just to the edge. Take some 2-3" strips of cloth, fold it lenght ways and iron it so that the two sides lay against one another. You can now use these to strengthen and build up the corners. (Just like ouside corners on dry wall.) Now, lay up your glass and resin on this; giving yourself a pretty good overlap once you've built up to even with the underside of the existing glass. One trick here is to scallop or zigzag the existing fiberglass edge: /\/\/\/\/\. Cut interlocking zigzags to match with your cloth. It give vastly more surface area to bond with and gives a very strong joint. To take it a step farther, you can taper the thickness of the existing points and make the matching valleys in the cloth smaller and smaller until the layer which matches the surface of the existing glass. Either way, continue to lay up till you get your desired thickness. It is a good idea to also make each successive layer over lap at least 1/2" more than the previous layer for 2-3 layers above the "existing surface" layer. This will make the join less visible and give it some backing. Once it's setup, remove the metal backing molds and clean up the seams, sanding and filling as neccessary.

A couple of hints: When ever I am going to add onto existing fiberglass, it is a good idea to roughen it up to give it some tooth (60-80 grit) and I always scrub it real good with acetone before any resin hits it. You probably want to do this before you put in your metal molds for the final time before layup begins, but be sure to wear latex gloves from then on so as not to get oils from your skin on the clean glass. It is a good idea to wipe down with acetone just before you go to work on it, just-in-case; also keep in mind the note above about cleaning any off any mold release also. Using great care, try to squegee (sp?) out any excess resin. This will keep it light and, believe it or not, stronger. If you have issues with strings raveling off your cut cloth, either get lock stitch woven cloth or, if you are like me, get a good, reasonably priced tight weave and go over the cut edges quickly with a bernz-o-matic or similar LP torch. This will weld the weave and help prevent raveling strings which I hate with a passion.

HTH,
Lynn

[Peter D]

Simon, if Lynn's scratch-built method looks a bit daunting, you could see if Peter Ransom of GT40s Australia will sell you his basic deep nostril kit (without the top bonnet hatch).

What you would get would be 3 bits - the 2 nostrils & a centre joiner piece. I am sure that they could easily be modified to fit most cars. I fitted this kit to my hatch & after some cutting & shaping, it worked out fine.

I think Peter's email is :

peter@drbsportscars.com

Kind Regards,

Peter D.

[Peter D]

The above pic shows the original shallow nostrils, the next pic shows the final deep ones.

[Tony Hunt]

Simon,
Your best bet is to contact Frank Catt at Wealdenengineer@aol.com.
He made a beautiful job of deepening my nostril panel, including painting it. What's more he got it right first time! [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]
If you still want to do it all yourself, I'm sure he'll give you lots of info on how to do it.

[Paul W]

I think Chris Melia has a GTD mold for deeper twin nostril panels that he made.

[Brett James-McCall]

Simon,
Paul is correct. Chris does a deeper twin nostril. If you wait you can come round and see mine when it turns up.

Brett

[RobBeddington]

Chris also made a 'one-off' deep twin nostril for my car - it's a fabulous job.

Cheers.

Rob

[BarryD]

Frank Catt did mine too and its excellent.
Barry D

[Howard Jones]

Simon, You can do this youself for the cost of a little fiberglass mat and the resin.

I think what you want to do is deepen the floors on the radiator exaust ports, to increase air flow thru the radiator. Correct?

OK lay the nostril cover assembly on its back nostrils up. Cut the bottom of the two nostrils sides with a hacksaw blade loose from the rest of the assemble leaving the base of the nostril opening attached to the body of the cover.The base being the end of the nostril at the top of each outlet when the assembly is right side up. Leave enough vertical wall on each side of the cut so that you can revit a thin piece of alum to it top and bottom. Also don't cut at the corner of the opening, save the corner so that you do not have to remake it. You now have the floors of both openings sort of flapping downwards when the nostril assembly is in its normal right side up posistion.

Pull down the floor to your desired new opening size and then revit a piece of thin alum to close the pie shaped gaps on both sides of the nostril openings. Drill several holes thru the alum pieces to alow the fiberglass resin to flow thru thus making the grafted on part stronger.

Cover the wound with fiberglass matting one side at at time so that the fiber glass resin does not run all over the place. About 4 thicknesses of mat will equal about a 1/8" thick when full of resin and hard. Mask off areas you don't want AFUed with dripping resin. Start out with small pieces and mix small amounts of resin at first if you havent done this kind of thing befor.

Make sure you clean and rough up all existing fiberglass areas that are going to be bonded to as in the comments above. Also sand the alum parts on both sides with 60 grit also.

When everthing is hard sand smooth and repaint.
Your end product will look as good as the orginal one and have bigger openings.

[David Gibbins]

Simon, mine was also done by Frank Catt - it’s excellent!