Has anyone ever done a write up on how to mold in your body kit. I read a really good write up on molding door panels, is it the same method? Can someone drop a link to write up or be a super nice person and do a write up for me.
It's not the same exactly, and the reason there's no write up on it is because no one can teach anyone how to do body work online, it's hands on. Anyone that doesn't have the skill shouldn't be attempting this themselves, unless they don't care if it breaks and they have to get their car repainted. molding kits in is harder to do right if you don't have the body work skills and knowledge to back it up.
Sorry if I came off short, I have to leave for work in a min.
yea it takes more than just bondo
shes right, its more then bondo fiberglass, and panle bond
sorry dude i cant teach you or show you online just w*o nt happen
can i haz bondo
ok, well I know a guy here that can do it. Its just getting him to show you anything is hard enough. I will see. But either way I have to learn somehow, best to learn on my own car.
Um What are you trying to mold. If you want to mold your FG front bumper, easiest is to just buy FG fenders that way you can just mold with glass and sand.
Im currently learning molding, and trying to right up a good tutorial. Here is my rough mold that has lasted roughly 3 months, with off road driving (you should see our crappy as California roads).
This is a FG front bumper to steel fenders atm.
What I did was sand off everything on the bumper that was going to be molded to just the FG, got rid of the primer and gel coat. THen I took a grinder to the fenders that were going to be molded.
I then cleaned both with degreasing agents.
Then I put Urethane (liquid nails, or something simliar), on the bumper and the fender, then bolted them together.
Then when that dried after 24 hours or so, I then used the same urethane to fill in the gaps till it was like maybe an 1/8 to a 1/6th under what would be flush. I then sanded down around the bumper and the fender, about 1/8th-16th. I then used some evergrain, or bondo (um evergrain is a synthetic deck product, but i think its a bondo or some crap, its green).
THen fill it in, and sand it flush.
Im going to be breaking my mold, soon becuase im going to be fully rebuilding the engine, and if this works out well i will be writing it up alot better.
But that is a rought guess.
I have tried using epoxy and bondo or just bondo
and it dosent work worth @!#$.
Jonny wrote:ok, well I know a guy here that can do it. Its just getting him to show you anything is hard enough. I will see. But either way I have to learn somehow, best to learn on my own car.
That is honestly your best bet. To learn PROPERLY you NEED hands on, and someone near you that knows what they're doing so they can show you.
(don't take this the wrong way DayUSex), but whatever you do... do NOT attempt this without having someone knowledgeable nearby. I understand wanting to learn, but you can't do it online... even if someone took pictures and full explanations of the individual steps... because pictures arn't going to show you all of what you need to look for. (see my sticky for an idea... it doesn't mention molding specifically... but it gives you the idea of the amount of work).
Plus, unless you have a good basic understanding of body work and basic skills... I would HIGHLY reccomend against trying something like this to learn on. NOT a good idea. Dont let it get ya down... but I'm just being honest.
well unfortunatly for me no one around me does body work so I have to figure it out on my own. And since my cavalier is nothing but primer, if the mold breaks I dont care. And since it will alawys be primer, I can perfect my method on that.
Personally I wouldnt suggest molding on a daily driver. If it is a show car then yes its all hands on and pretty much has to be self taught. On a daily driver though all the vibrations of driving and what not would put all the bodywork into jeopardy. put thats just MPO
I went from an import to being part of the J-Body nation.
yeah any time i drive on a really rough road my mold seems to take a beating.
I dont plan on it being my daily driver. ANd even my daily driver only sees 3,000 miles a year. I work 7 blocks from my house. And anywhere else I go I take my GF's corolla.
well unfortunatly for me no one around me does body work so I have to figure it out on my own. And since my cavalier is nothing but primer, if the mold breaks I dont care. And since it will alawys be primer, I can perfect my method on that.
you will care becasue when it cracks it has to go all the way back down and start all over again
so why not ask around the local custom shops for a price won`t hurt
can i haz bondo
because I refuse to pay any money for work on the cavalier beside paying org members
its a cavalier for christs sake
Best way to learn is to take advice and do it urself. I am learning right now. Just shaved the door handles and had a guy look at it and said it looked real good.
yeah but shaving is easy, beucase its metal to metal, just weld a piece in then add minimal bondo.
Good job though!!
I did my own as well, boy was that fun =P
molding is a differnt world all together as it is FG to metal, two things that dont like to be one.
^^^ precisely. Molding is a totally different ball game... very difficult if you don't know what you're doing and don't have the proper training
A THREAD BACK FROM THE DEAD. L0L jk
Hey, I drive an o2 honda civic ex (eM2).
Fully molded all way around except front bumper (rear bumper, side skirts, front fenders all MOLDED!)
My question is.. to any body specialist?
Why would anybody mold a body?
Why does it take soo long to mold a body?
How do u mold any body?
How does molding work?
I'm sure original owner was aware of the stress cracks on the body?
& this art of his, is 3yrs of body work. Not himself did the body work but a professional body shop did.
I just don't see how it takes sooo long??
Yes, my car is a daily driver, show car.
"aLL show, N0 g0!"
S00000N! I'm getting a cb7 (91-93 accord ex STANDARD TRANSMISSION) for a daily driver & my eM2 will be down for my project!
The person i bought my car from, lives 300miles down southern caL in a town called PheLan.
He had $$$$ to maintain his car.
Never got hassle by cops about performances parts. I DO! since i'm up in NORTERN CALI.
I was on a 35series tires now i'm on a 45series. Lowered 1 1/4
45series crack'd my molding on the rear fenders & i should sew les schawb but i didn't want to waste a bunch of $$$$
I don't have $$$$$ to pull outta my @$$! I can barley maintences the car but try to keep the body straight & clean best i can.
this weekend i'm going with a 40series.
I did some body work from a hit and run I had last friday.
all week, has been nothing but body work..
Pulled both muscles in both forearms from sanding. Good thing it wasn't my ligaments this time.
^^it's not the best, but pretty good for a beginner.^^
I've done a little sanding & playing with a little bondo in other areas around the body.
So, i put alot of effort & time to get this straight as possible. This new bondo & fyber glass mix in it.
Love it! Better than the sheets of fyber..
Well sorry if the pixs are bigg. & hope my questions will be answer'd.
Thanxs
Darren
clevis: nice looking civic... clean, flows well, not overly done.
Your repair work isn't bad for a beginner, I can see a couple of little "imperfections", but for getting started it's not bad.
Now for your questions:
Why would anybody mold a body?
For looks. Makes the car look "cleaner" and more uniform. What most people don't take into consideration when looking into molding kits is the fact that it's not a good idea on a daily driver. When you mold in body kits or panels, you're not "molding" materials that are the same. It's usually metal to urethane, or metal to fiberglass. Either way, no matter what you do it's not going to have the strength to be durable and last a long time. In the areas where it's molded, there's going to be a weak spot prone to cracking/breaking/etc. Many people don't take this into consideration when looking into "molding" kits or body panels on vehicles.
Why does it take soo long to mold a body?
Because when you do it properly, you need to take all of the necessary steps in order to make sure it's going to hold as well as it possibly can. Plus, it's a large area to work with. Anytime I molded anything in, I didn't simply just use body filler and fiberglass... I'd also use a structural adhesive in addition to make the bond stronger. Then, you have to consider after the adhesive is set (which depending on what you're using and the conditions, and sometimes even personal preference) can take quite a while to set enough to work with it. Even if it's "soft set", you can't really work with it safely until it's fully set, which takes a good bit of time. Generally after everything is prepped and the adhesive is set, you're pretty much done with it for the day before you go back and work on it more. Then with making everything "even", it takes time to make sure everything looks and feels good and even enough to proceed to the next steps. It's a time consuming process to make sure everything is right.
How do u mold any body?
There's a reason this question hasn't been fully answered or a sticky written up on it... you can't teach this sort of stuff on the internet. If you don't have the proper training and skills necessary, well... it's just impossible to properly teach using words on a computer screen. Auto body isn't just about how things LOOK, it's also how things FEEL. When you're doing things like this, you have to know what to LOOK for, but you also have to be able to FEEL for low spots, high spots, or anything else that might be an imperfection in the work. Sometimes the differences are so subtle the untrained won't even notice them, until there's paint on the car... then you SEE them. If you don't know what you're looking for and feeling for, you won't spot the imperfections and the work will be crappy.. and that's just things you can't properly explain in type on the internet. Then you have painting, which is a totally different ball game. You can't feel paint for imperfections when you're spraying, you have to know what to look for and how to fix imperfections that appear when you're doing so. Some people think painting is so easy a monkey can do it... those people are uneducated on the world of auto body paint. You have to know what fish eyes are, why they appear and how to fix them when they show up, as well as what to do if the paint "lifts" when you're spraying, or any of the other paint imperfections that show up while you're spraying. Sure, any monkey can spray, but any monkey can NOT spray well without the proper training. There's fan patterns to know, overlaping the spray patterns properly when using different paints, different sized needles for your guns, different spray patterns, etc.
How does molding work?
I think this is self explanitory. It doesn't exactly "work"... it just is. It's simply just making panels that were not previously part of one another, part of one another in a visual sense. You can't make metal and fiberglass into one piece because they are not like materials, it's simply making them LOOK like they were all one piece.
fallen angle.
THANK U FOR THE WRITE UP.
You've answer'd my questions that i've been looking for..
Sorry for a reply back soo late.. Been busy with work & For the weekend, I've been in reno (biggest little city) 3 1/2 hr drive.
Toe*day i'm gonna grab some 40series.
REALLY APPRECIATE YOUR HELP!
THANXS
DaRReN.
I molded by rear bumper, and so far it has lasted about 1 1/2 years of driving, which includes MI winter. No cracks, but its also not finished. I had run into some money problems, and living arrangements, and now i've focused my money else where on the car since it was winter, so I will be finishing up all of the body work this summer. I don't drive that nice, but like I said, their is not cracks, and everything seems to be holding just fine for now. I bottomed the car out once, and got rear ended (driver was going slow), and the molded part held up find. This is also my first and only attempt to mold something. I got some really good advice from someone, plus I had them look it over a little bit through the process, but all of the work was done by me. I can't lie, its a pain in the *ss.
Martinez wrote:I molded by rear bumper, and so far it has lasted about 1 1/2 years of driving, which includes MI winter. No cracks, but its also not finished. I had run into some money problems, and living arrangements, and now i've focused my money else where on the car since it was winter, so I will be finishing up all of the body work this summer. I don't drive that nice, but like I said, their is not cracks, and everything seems to be holding just fine for now. I bottomed the car out once, and got rear ended (driver was going slow), and the molded part held up find. This is also my first and only attempt to mold something. I got some really good advice from someone, plus I had them look it over a little bit through the process, but all of the work was done by me. I can't lie, its a pain in the *ss.
what adhesive did you use and what material is your rear? (and if u get rearended..you said the driver was going slow? woudln't that be YOU?
haha
anyways I'd like to add to this post..i just got done molding my urithane skirts onto my cav...here's a few pix
in the process of adhearing it to the body of the car, I literally added screws and screwed the sides onto the body of the car too. when adhearing the parts to the metal, never hold anything back!! Its the one part that will be the weakest!
siick cav..
hope your sig is what the car looks right now but other than that, clean molding!
