I will be starting the body work on my 79 soon, and I'm a little pissed off about the way they choose too build the fiber glass panels on vettes. It looks like they used just a chopper gun, or fiber glass matt with out using any woven fiber on the surface or sub-surfaces of the panels. Looks like they just poped the panels out of thier molds and painted them with no surface preperation. This was a luxury car, where is the quality?? Too make matters worse no gel coat was aplied, so after awhile any unpainted surfaces begin too fray as strands of fiberglass work thier way loose. This also makes doing a paint job interesting, no wonder most body shops won't even look at a vette. Also by using unwoven material the panels are much much weaker and are prone too cracking from moderate impacts. A well made fiber glass panel can take a signifigant impact, in the boating industry fiber glass structures are even commonly used in wear points. I am serriously thinking about removing all of the panels on my car and making molds out of them so that I can fabricate either woven fiber glass or kevlar panels. This is alot of work, but as it stands now in order too propperly repair the panels I would need too remove them anyway so that they can be completely reworked. Fabricating new pannels will not be that much more work than repairing the old ones (the car spent half it's life out side, the inside of the pannels are bad), allthough it will be more expensive. I also like how they used a bondo like substance too glue the pannels on.

 

Sounds like somebody already stripped your car with some pretty aggressive stripper.Your not describing any Covette I have stripped.

 

Yeah it does sound like someone media blasted the panels. Mine isnt anything like that at all. A kevlar Corvette, bulletproof lol. Now that would be a cool mod.

Good luck with your project and take a lot of pictures!

 

yes, some of the kevlars look realy cool. Cheaper than carbon fiber also. It's about 50 bucks per yard on a 40 inch roll for kevlar and 80+ for carbon fiber I believe. They also come in mixed strand colors like black/red, yellow/black, ect but that get's realy expensive. (not nearly expensive as buying pre-fabricated after market panels though) I think I will paint the panels I've always thought the carbon fiber look was tacky, Carbon fiber is a light structural material not a fashion statement lol. Hmm, I guess someone could have media blasted it, but i'm still pissed off at chevy for using crap material lol.

 

Ummm...how many Corvettes have you worked on? Have you been to any NCRS shows and looked at any Duntov or survivor award Vettes? They all have original body panels and paint, and most look like the day they were made. What you see when a body looks in bad shape is because it's been wrecked and improperly repaired. Only the C-1's, which use resin and mat without pressure and heat like the early C-3 FRP and the later SMC panels, exhibit shrinkage cracks. On the original FRP and SMC panels, there are no glass strands at the surface. Only if you grind or media blast off the top layer of resin will you expose the strands.

 

I had a customer use metal strip and took the gel-coat off.Looked bad real bad.

 

I dont think Corvettes even have a gel-coat. Do they?

 

No gel-coat.

 

sorry a gray sealing primer-exposed the fibers

 

It wouldn't be bullet proof, kevlar vest's are bullet proof because kevlar transfers impact shock waves extremely fast so that the power behind the bullet is spread out over a larger area before it can break thru the vest. because a kevlar panel is very thin and also because resin is used to harden it kevlar panels are not bullet proof. Youdo however need a special grinding wheel to cut them once they've cured and they can take hard impacts without being damaged.

 

The out side is fine, I was refering too the inside. If I reach way up under the back of my car the fiber on the back side is frayed, the front fenders are also like this but it's not something you would ever notice because of the in-access-ability of these areas. basicly if it's not painted it's fraying. I'm sure most of those cars were also garage kept thier entire life. heat changes, humidity, ect will wear down bare matt glass. I was not refering too shrinkage cracks, shrinkage mostly aplies too the type of resin used. I was refering too stress cracks and damage done as a result of impacts; some one slams thier car door into your front fender; big rock chips on top of rear fender; ect.

 

Additionally the Kevlar fabric you would use in a laminated structure is Kevlar 49. Kevlar 29 is used in ballistic applications. It's a totally different material.

You are off by a factor of at least 2 on your prices of the raw materials. Kevlar is available for <$30/yard and up until very recently Carbon was significantly LESS. I'm also not sure where you're looking at your raw materials, but 40" is not a standard width. 36, 50, and 60" are industry standards.

Carbon prices are a little goofy right now with the shortage. Even so, I've never seen $80/yd for any normal fabric. A 1k fabric might be up there, but that's not what you would use for body panels.

That being said, it would cost more than an entire, restored 79 is worth to build molds and lay up a composite body yourself. If you're going to do it, you might as well do a steel bumper car, or a mid-year for that matter. It sounds like you've worked on similar projects before, but you may not realize how huge of an undertaking this would be. I'm a Corvette fanatic who does composite fabrication on a daily basis and have talked myself out of such an undertaking a few times now. It's just not reasonably feasible.

 

I'm sorry, I'm not trying to sound condescending in the least, but you seem to be a bit confused. If you are under the perception that carbon is $80/yd, how do you think you could build a panel for less than what a pre-fabricated aftermarket panel? Corvette Central gets $170 for a quarter panel. I guarantee that piece has at least 5-6 yards of material in it. Even if you use S-glass (which is what I would recommend) at $8/yd you're better off buying a quarter from CC unless your time is worth nothing.

Take it from someone who does this for a living, you're looking at at least 100 man hours per mold. The hood and rear surrounds are more complex and would take twice as long. Are you willing to invest 1500-2000 man hours to have a one-off 79 body?

 

I was wondering, what difference does it make if the backside of the panel is rough? If you lay matting in a mold, the back side is going to be rough, too.

 

No original Corvette panels have loose or frayed strands. Both sides are encapsulated in resin. The only way bare 'glass will deteriorate is by prolonged exposure to direct sunlight.