fiberglass body panels.

[FTLdirtball]

I was driving into work today, and i got to thinking i could probably make fiber glass fenders if i could find some nice clean ones to make a mold out of. any thoughts ?

[Ron in Indiana]

Are you talking fronts or rears? There in lies the rub, finding a good set of clean ones. I would think the front fenders would be very difficult to make considering the design. There are fenders out there that need work but not as much as trying to make new ones. But hey if there's a will there's a way, most times anyway. I make repair patches for the front fenders at the rear edge that rots out due to the inner brace holding dirt. It takes a shrinker/stretcher set to make them.

[FTLdirtball]

i was thinking fronts. i know its a pretty complex shape but i think i could make it work. obviously if i had a chop sprayer it would be easier. but like you say if there's a will. i'm really just kind of testing the waters to see if anyone but me would be interested in a set. or if someone had a set of fenders good enough to use as a mold.

[MasterYota]

I just purchased a pair of Fiberglass front fenders for my Toyota, and I was exceptionally impressed with the quality. Granted they are not Dodge front fenders, but I'm fairly sure they have just as many curves.

The quality of the fenders that your thinking of producing will depend greatly on the quality of your molds. These fenders are fabbed from handlaid glass, not chopper, and the mold was a two piece, bolt-together unit. There is a small mold line I'll have to clean up, along with the edges, but thats minimal work, and allows me some leeway when setting the door and grill gaps anyway.

A trick the manufacturer told me about was to use expanding foam to create your mold shapes. The foam is cheap, easy to carve, and easy to work with. Spray the foam with some mold-release, and start laying glass. I would think that with the foam trick, any fenders in even poor condition could be made into a decent mold template.

Good luck!

[oldmopar]

i was thinking fronts. i know its a pretty complex shape but i think i could make it work. obviously if i had a chop sprayer it would be easier. but like you say if there's a will. i'm really just kind of testing the waters to see if anyone but me would be interested in a set. or if someone had a set of fenders good enough to use as a mold.

If the fenders were available and the cost was considerably less then good original replacement fenders I would be interested. However since in the next 6 months or so I will either replace or repair my fenders I do not think you could consider me a possible customer considering normal start up time for a venture like this.

[712edf]

fiberglass fenders

Not sure how acquainted you are with working with fiberglass but one place to look for pointers is the marine industry. Its alot more prevelant there.

[FTLdirtball]

most of my fiberglass experience is in the wind industry, i've been doing blade repairs for the last year.

i was thinking i would try to make them out of multi-directional (biax), chop mat, and foam core.

I really don't know if and when this would happen. I'm on the road most of the time. just spit balling. but thanks for the feedback

[Ron in Indiana]

You have a better working knowledge of fiberglass than I do so if you think it's possible go for it. The obvious challenge is finding a good set of pattern fenders. A friend of mine was going to try to make FFPW rear fenders out of SMC at his company but the same problem lies in getting a good set. The other with that process is the cost of making a mold $$$$$. If I come accross a good set I'll let you know but all the fenders I see are banged up. I would think the headlight area would be the toughest part of making a mold in Fiberglass.

[Charles Talbert]

Rear fenders already available

Mar-K offers very nice fiberglass rear fenders for the FFPW's. I would use them in a second on my own truck, they are that nice. They may be interested in producing fronts also, if they had a good pattern to mold from. I also have 2 local Co's who do this, worth having them take a look I suppose.

[Charles Talbert]

I was driving into work today, and i got to thinking i could probably make fiber glass fenders if i could find some nice clean ones to make a mold out of. any thoughts ?

Do you have capability to make this mold & produce the fenders with a good pattern?

[FTLdirtball]

I was going to try and make a negative mold out of a decent set of fenders( if i can find some. mine are really beat up) by just laminating over the top of them. I am not really set up for this at home. but I could probably (with a couple trys) get a decent mold. I could also possibly make a two piece mold that could be bolted together.

Unfortunately I'm on the road for another 4 weeks so i really can't get started until then.

[Charles Talbert]

Let us know where you go with this, like with any project such as this, you can't expect to become wealthy over night, but I believe there would be a market for them once a good product hit the martket place.

[FTLdirtball]

yeah i'm not really worried about making money, its just somthing to keep me out of the bar. i'll take pictures along the way.