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Hey All,

This is purely theory.

When taking out off my GH's doors, I came to realise how bloody heavy they are. It got me wondering how much weight could be saved if fibreglass or even carbon-fibre doors/panels were used.

That then further led to wondering, what is involved in actually making said doors?
Has anyone ever done it?
How much did/do they cost to make?

Cheers,
Jer

Easier option is trying to obtain fibreglass quarter panels/boot.. will still save a lot of weight but not as much as doors I imagine.

Just the way doors are made would be difficult to replicate in fibreglass (unless only the outter shell was steel, and removable.. but I assume not)
Fibreglass bonnets are illegal last time I checked as they form part of the crumple zone in a crash, hence why you also cant legally remove the webbing underneath it.

Legalities aside, a thin fibreglass sheet in place of a thick steel bonnet with steel webbing would save like 15kg on a scorp, sigmas may have smaller bonnets though

Shouldn't be too expensive when just replicating original shapes too


[edit]:
You mentioned cost.. every fibreglasser is different and it would need to be custom moulded, ring around the local area is all I can say there, even better if you drop in and show them exactly what you want

is this going to be a street car ?

if so forget about composite panels as they are illegal on the street

yeah this idea was when i was gonna keep it as a racer... I'm still considering making moulds though.... maybe... one day lol

I'd hate to be in a car with fibre-glass doors and get 'tee-boned'. I feel much safer with a steel plate & intrusion bars protection. ;)

you still put intrusion bars in fibreglass ones... personally i'd rather be in a decent fibreglass car than a tin can sigma if i was gonna get tboned

vr4retrofit wrote:As a fibreglasser I can tell you I'd rather have metal doors in a t-bone accident.

Metal will bend and fold in an accident taking most of the impact. Fibreglass has tensile stength but it has F.A. impact resistance. When a force is applied to fibreglass it snaps and sends sharp shards everywhere. Would you really want to be in the car with those flying towards you?

As for actually making them it would be damn hard and if somone came to me wanting it done I'd put it in the too hard basket. Cost? Fibreglass is about $3-$4 per metre Carbon Fibre about $40 per metre. I'd say off the top of my head you'd be looking at $200 per door made out of glass, and thats provided you have a mould. You'd be looking at a couple of grand for 4 door moulds if you can find someone willing to do it.

and by the time you braced up a glass door to stop it from flopping and twisting all over the shop you be able to gut a tin door and have it weigh about the same

2 of my mate both with LJ toranas one is all steel and 2 door the other has glass bumpers bonnet boot and dash but is 4 door, the 2 door is 12kg lighter

the carbon doors on a 911 race car weights 3.7kgs complete
with lexan window
but make sure the a cage in it for impact protection
then the cage weighs the car down you cant win
cheers stealth

lol, yeah that's what i was also wondering about when i see the cars with all this carbon fibre paneling etc and then more metal in the car than outside... although I realise the cage is also to stiffen the chassis a heap so you would want to lower the weight even more so to compensate... anyway it was theory as I said in my original post...
thanks

I think it's cheaper to just make more power.
$3000 will get you a pretty good turbo.

Man if i had $3000 id get new doors..

COBWBS wrote:Man if i had $3000 id get new doors..

$3000 would get me a new carby and intake

I was thinking about making fibre glass panels for my Sigma GN. Because of fibre glass panels being dangerous in an accident, I thought about that you could integrate weak spots into the panel so it'll crumple rather than splinter.

As for the doors, I would take out anything that is not needed that can be unscrewed/unbolted. I wouldn't mod them at all, or replace them with fibre glass replacements.