Does anyone have links on how to make a fiberglass mold and make a bumper out of that mold? Also does anyone know of composite fabricators to do such a job.

 

compositefab maybe? it normally costs a lot of money to make a mold so it may not even be worth it if you are only making one bumper.

 

your very right. Just for us to make the molds for a custom hood cost over $5,000 in materials and labor

 

if you dont mind me asking, what kind of mold do you use? aluminum, sprayed fiberglass, foam(too many types, haha some can be as hard as aluminum), steel(highly unlikely), some other form of composites?

 

it really all depends on the part that is going to be made out of it. most are just normal glass with foam cores to be ridged. I have aluminum heated molds for products that I need to make several in a day.

 

aluminum is generally for smaller parts right? why do you use foam core over wood ribs? is it just that much easier?

 

an aluminum mold for a hood would be 20K, bumpers I bet would be just ask much

 

yes the aluminum molds are for smaller parts because of the price of them. The main reason we use foam is because it is A LOT easier to work with!

Here is an example of an aluminum hood mold so you can get an idea of what is all involved. These are not our nor did we make them. Just for illustration. These I believe were over $100,000 each

 

Any links to put up anyone? I am always up for some new mold making reading. Haven't done any composite stuff for like six months now....would like to see some more how-to's of cool stuff...maybe some tubing molds.

 

Hey I took that picture, LOL



Those were the hood molds for the C5 Z06 program I worked on in 2002-03. Those molds are over $200K and they are invar steel not Al. I've never used such bad *** molds before. You can't see it in that pic but these molds were on tracks next to a 30 ft long autoclave. Aluminum should never be used in something that big, at least not where tolerances are important. We used invar steel due to its low CTE, it matches that of carbon epoxy pretty well so the mold isn't changing shape during the cure.

Also check out my composite forum for tips on DIY/Pro composite fabrication

 

I could not remeber where I got those pics from ! thanks Adam!