Wheel Arches
With the outer body shell not being bonded to the inner structure around the rear wheel arches I set to work using some fibreglass matting to bond these sections together. Having not done any fibreglass work for some time I was pleased with the outcome.
I then used a fibreglass primer to coat inside all of the arches.
Following this I used black Tigerseal to seal around the edges of each wheel arch.
I finally used a multi purpose marine/fibreglass paint from TA Paints to get a nice high gloss black finish.
I am pretty pleased with the outcome 😀
Hi Steve, I see you have fibre glassed the gaps in the wheel arches. I was advised by AK Sportscars not to do this. The reason being that if the body heats up in the sun then it flexes a bit. It needs the gap there so the vertical inside face of the wheel arch doesn't pull down the top surface of the body shell.
ReplyDeleteI had a considerable gap on mine also. I used scrim tape to provide some backing and then used multiple application of sikaflex marine sealant to fill it in before painting over it in a similar way to you.
I haven't done a blog, but you can see some pics of my build on @daveyrich on instagram.
Hi Dave, thanks for taking the time to comment. I had mainly used tiger seal (similar to sikaflex) with a few strips of fibreglass on the inside of the boot, however yes I was a little concerned after I had done this as I had subsequently found out the same as you, albeit I was told it would likely be an issue when in the spray oven. I spoke with SMS Autospray, the company I have lined up to paint my cobra, as I was obviously concerned. They specialise in repairing and spraying fibreglass cars (I think AK use them a fair amount for spraying, they also do a lot of Lotus sports cars) and they said it will be fine. Hopefully I won’t experience any issues! I hope you’ve found some of my blog notes useful, I will certainly make a point of looking at your photos. Cheers, Steve
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