The molds I'm making are not hard enough. 4 were no better than laminated tape and the other 2 either bent out of shape or plain out cracked too much by time I got it out the car. Am I supposed to be using fiberglass mat? Because I'm only using the resin. How many coats do I put on before I pull the mold out?
Fiberglass in hatch
Over the past few months, I've tried about 6 times to build myself some fiberglass enclosures to sit on both sides of the cubbies in the hatch. Needless to say I failed each time, and the serious lack of information on the subject coupled with frustration has led me to almost give up all hope of ever getting the huge box out of my hatch while keeping my bass. So what I need from y'all is one of three things:
1. A dumbed down walk trough to working with fiberglass
2. Somebody to build the molds themselves for me
3. Approval to use the existing plastic panel as the base of the mold itself
Any info or help would be greatly appreciated, this is the home stretch to finishing my interior once and for all.
1. A dumbed down walk trough to working with fiberglass
2. Somebody to build the molds themselves for me
3. Approval to use the existing plastic panel as the base of the mold itself
Any info or help would be greatly appreciated, this is the home stretch to finishing my interior once and for all.
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Alright now I finally getting the info I've been needing. 1 final question though, how do I apply the mat? Do I apply the wet resin onto the masking tape and throw the mat on it, then resin mat resin mat til it's thick enough?
Alright guys so I gave it another go and tried the right side cubby again. 4 layers of resin/mat/resin/mat seems to have given me quite a sturdy box. I pulled the mold out and gave it a decent stress test and it seems pretty stable. I started on the left side cubby and it's still drying as I type so hopefully that one comes out just as good. Tomorrow I'll be trimming the enclosures and ordering the mounting rings. Now I just have to decide which direction I want to mount them, so far straight up seems to make the most sense. Also Greg, I have no idea just how strong fiberglass is by feel, so my confidence with these enclosures holding up at full volume is getting me a bit worried, can I drill out a small hole on each one and do like a fake vent/port to relieve pressure or should I just have confidence 4 layers will be sturdy enough? It's sturdier than the plastic cubby is though, I can tell you that much.
I didn't know it boiled down to all that. I'm a fan of ported boxes, I've actually had 3 over the years and are certainly my preferred style. I'm able to do the math but just too lazy, I'll just keep it sealed and do the 6 layers probably. Should be fine. Hopefully.
Alright so update: over the past few days I've managed to add 2 more layers of resin and mat each, then mounted the speaker ring in the right side enclosure and covered it with fleece and 2 coats of resin. I wanna do 3 more coats of resin on top of that and add in the mat inside around the ring and the sticks to reinforce those as well. Tomorrow I'll be doing a testfit and a dry run with it to make sure its going to be stable, then its just a matter of making it look nice and securing it well enough. I can't quite thank you guys enough for all the help you all have been, especially Greg, you're my hero bro hahaha!
Wow, you save the day again Greg! I was just going to do pure resin on top of the fleece and throw it in there to test. I'll do few thick coats of resin/mat to finish it up then.
I'll see how it all works out, I may leave the sticks in there for additional support just in case. I'm just scared that I've clocked over a week on this project so far and I'm not 100% it'll turn out fine. I keep having a scene in my mind where everything's hooked up, then the sub just blows the enclosure apart.
I've been doing my spare cover, headliner and door inserts with black velvet and I have enough of it leftover to cover the first main box so I'll probably wind up doing that. I have a slight nasty crease in the fleece so I'll probably roughly bondo and sand that down to at least 90% cover up that mistake. I'm also lucky its on the side where the bench seat sits so it'll be hard to notice to begin with. I got 6 million projects going on at the present time so I haven't been able to touch my box since Thursday, but today for sure my buddy and I'll power through building up the mat/resin layers on the fleece and hopefully later on today have an ugly box to test. Fingers crossed it all goes well. I also caught a small hole in the box around a corner where the fleece meets the fiberglass, so I need to patch that as well. So also I've seen people reinforce the inside around the ring with the mat, is that really necessary to do if I keep the sticks in and build up a good 5-6 layers on top of the fleece? Just seems like it'd be a royal pain.
I figured you guys may want to see what I'm working with as well, so this was taken after the 2nd coat of resin only over the fleece. I trimmed the excess fleece off since then and took the sub back out, and getting ready for the mat/resin layers being done today. The mold is molded from the lower black passenger cubby in the hatch where the tail light access door is. The lower part of the box extends to just over the strut tower, and the top lies just short of the bench seat clamp. Hopefully it fits snug without any trimming, as I am beyond ready to throw this project into the "done" pile
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Good news and bad news, I tested the box today, and it didn't explode lol. Bad news is I have 2 massive air leaks between the fleece and the mold itself so it sounds kinda bad and not very loud. I'm just glad it didn't explode, so just a few more things to do on it and it'll be ready to attach. It looks good though, no pics or vid unfortunately.
That was actually similar to my plan of attack. I was going to glass the entire inside rim around the fleece and try to figure out how to do the outside bottom. I also thought about maybe glueing some fleece or deadener inside as an added insulation to help with the leaks. I haven't gotten around to trimming the edges yet when I did the test fit so it sat out a few inches too far, but one thing I DID figure out is that this thing isn't going to keep itself in place. It kept trying to roll towards the weight of the sub. I'll definitely have to put in some work securing it. For now I'm taking a break from it, I threw so much of my time into it I just got burnt out for now. I'll probably start again later this week because I really want to finish it. If I don't like it when I finish it, I'll probably try to sell it, so any of you that may want one without having to put all the work into making one, keep your eyes peeled.
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