Adam C.
GT40s Sponsor
Well I call it my summer project because it began sometime in June I think. Like many things however, it went over timeline and over budget, but what a learning experience!
I thought I would share my first real experience in fiberglass. Although I have helped out on making parts, and have done a little carbon work, this is the first thing I have done start to finish. I am certainly no Chris Melia or Bill Hough, just an engineer with too much free time.
My college buddy, Stacy Henson and I decided that we would like to build MKII’s from scratch, and so over the past year or so we have been gathering info, parts, etc. To me, two of the most defining things on the MKII are the T-44 (one recently sold for $42,000), and the rear brake scoops (sell for around $400). Since we aren’t exactly loaded, we started with the two-order of magnitude cheaper rear scoops. We figured, rather than buy two pairs of scoops, we’d just copy a set and make our own. With some initial figuring we thought that we could surely make the mold for under $800 in no time, and then the parts that came out of the mold would be practically free. We also figured that we could do it all in a couple of months, just working on it during weekends. Ha!
We began with our borrowed scoop which we spent a lot of time on sanding, priming, etc. Once we were happy with the finish, we constructed a jig to hold the snorkel in place, make the various parting lines for the mold pieces, and provide flanges for the mold. Below is a shot of the fixture and original part. The mold was split into three pieces, left, right, and front.
The little rubber bouncy balls are to provide locating features to all the mold pieces fit back together nice. We used Kleen Klay to fill the voids between the part and the board. Wax, wax, and then wax the whole thing some more.
I thought I would share my first real experience in fiberglass. Although I have helped out on making parts, and have done a little carbon work, this is the first thing I have done start to finish. I am certainly no Chris Melia or Bill Hough, just an engineer with too much free time.
My college buddy, Stacy Henson and I decided that we would like to build MKII’s from scratch, and so over the past year or so we have been gathering info, parts, etc. To me, two of the most defining things on the MKII are the T-44 (one recently sold for $42,000), and the rear brake scoops (sell for around $400). Since we aren’t exactly loaded, we started with the two-order of magnitude cheaper rear scoops. We figured, rather than buy two pairs of scoops, we’d just copy a set and make our own. With some initial figuring we thought that we could surely make the mold for under $800 in no time, and then the parts that came out of the mold would be practically free. We also figured that we could do it all in a couple of months, just working on it during weekends. Ha!
We began with our borrowed scoop which we spent a lot of time on sanding, priming, etc. Once we were happy with the finish, we constructed a jig to hold the snorkel in place, make the various parting lines for the mold pieces, and provide flanges for the mold. Below is a shot of the fixture and original part. The mold was split into three pieces, left, right, and front.
The little rubber bouncy balls are to provide locating features to all the mold pieces fit back together nice. We used Kleen Klay to fill the voids between the part and the board. Wax, wax, and then wax the whole thing some more.