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Datsun Z Fiberglass a Real Review


CRAracer05

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Since I am restoring a few z cars, we ended up contacting him. He answered his phone and told us about his business. I did not order anything as I know these types of small businesses too well.

 

Is there really a market for z car fiberglass/carbon parts? The reason I ask is that I could do this. I've for a full shop, employees etc..... But it has to be worth my time since I have a ton of work....

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I sold CF and glass hoods and hatches for the S30 and S130 for 10 years.  There's a small market that can be a bit bigger if you're willing to under price MSA and your other competitors.  That will keep the margin thin (25% gross) and you'll need to sell 10 to 15 parts to recover your tooling costs - if you build real production molds.  If you build cheap molds like most of these folks do you quality will suffer and after about 10 parts you will have to replace the molds or sell junk and ignore the complaints.

 

The biggest issue I found was shipping costs.  These are large items and are charged by volume not weight.  So a 5 lb. CF hood in a cardboard box was charged as if it weighed 165 lbs. because of the volume.  50% of my sale were outside the USA.

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thanks, John! And, thanks for the email yesterday.

I purchased a used R180 and will replace the side gears to make it all work.

 

This is mainly for my own cars. We build full panels for purpose built race cars etc......That market is able to sustain and we don't have so much of a reach for ROI.post-9962-0-38151800-1426274745_thumb.jpg

 

Here you can see wet lay up and vacuum bag part for a large project we have currently.

 

 

I spoke to my front desk man about his conversation with Datsun Z Fiberglass- One man shop with too many orders- plain and simple.

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I spoke to my front desk man about his conversation with Datsun Z Fiberglass- One man shop with too many orders- plain and simple.

 

No. Dude is a scam. Here's a stickie I had saved on my computer while my order was in limbo. Info gotten mostly from whois.net domain info and searching bits of information from there :

 

James Jenns

2015793077 - (number he uses for Datsun Fiberglass)

50 Spring Street

Ramsey, New Jersey

 

Wayne Tile Co (also located at 50 Spring Street. I called them and they verified there was no auto business in their block. Been there for 15 years)

(201) 825-8000

 

fiberglassfabrication@hotmail.com

 

0 West Ramsey Industrial Park (not a real address)

Ramsey, NJ 07446 - View Map

Phone: (551) 579-4921 (number he uses for below business with no website or actual physical address)

Email: exoticsupercars@outlook.com (another business)

 

Fiberglass Fabrication of New Jersey

Ramsey New Jersey 07446

FiberglassFabrication.NJ@gmail.com

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Oh....that black G-Nose in the back looks like the one on my 73 after I made a spoiler for it!

i'm going to buy one of those jdm replica air dams. the black gnose is modeled after an IMSA style. I've had this for many years...needs some tlc....I think I'm going to use the white one. I've found all the hardware and can make all the mounting brackets......

it's not easy to fit...i bolted the headlight extensions and center section together......this FRP is a bit thin as well....not sure I trust it....

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what parts do people need?

I'm going to make my own carbon parts......

 

the problem is that parts are only as accurate as the piece you make them from and the quality of the mold. If there's a perfect part to tool off of, it should fit.

Edited by Hoover
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  • 3 months later...

I sold CF and glass hoods and hatches for the S30 and S130 for 10 years.  There's a small market that can be a bit bigger if you're willing to under price MSA and your other competitors.  That will keep the margin thin (25% gross) and you'll need to sell 10 to 15 parts to recover your tooling costs - if you build real production molds.  If you build cheap molds like most of these folks do you quality will suffer and after about 10 parts you will have to replace the molds or sell junk and ignore the complaints.

 

The biggest issue I found was shipping costs.  These are large items and are charged by volume not weight.  So a 5 lb. CF hood in a cardboard box was charged as if it weighed 165 lbs. because of the volume.  50% of my sale were outside the USA.

 

Having purchased a FG hatch from you (excellent quality & well worth the price) & having it shipped to Toronto, Canada my only sort of gripe was not so much in the shipping cost to my door but the extra $150.00 the shipping co. charged for filing customs clearance papers which they faxed me to fill out & then I refaxed them back. The only other option was to take time off work, go to the other end of the city where the airport/customs clearence warehouse was, file the paper work myself & pick up the shipment at the same time which would have defeated the cost of purchasing "to my door" delivery. I also do remember talking to you on the phone about the twice the required size shipping box that you used to ship the hatch in as you had a one size fits all box since you were also shipping larger items out to customers then the hatch at the time. I'm not sure if this contributed to your found shipping costs by volume vs weight. Out of speculation this may have put off potential customers as this is what I'm reading from your statement.

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My take on Datsun Z Fiberglass is its just another Show Cars-Body-Parts operation. Meaning - has a website with all kinds of products that uses ripped from the net photos to illustrate the product but actually has no moulds made for the products advertised. The lag time between ordering & beyond said fulfillment deadline would indicate that this individual is running around trying to find a part to make a mould from or is making it from scratch to no avail.

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The shipping boxes cost me about $53 each in lots of 10. They were custom made and were designed to handle a 280zx hood. Unfortunately I couldn't afford to order or store a lot of 100 which would have cut the price in half. Multiple sizes would have added to the cost.

 

I made no money on picking and shipping, I just tried to cover my costs. I used to get much better pricing on shipping but the two carriers I used stopped shipping composite body parts due to damage claims. In 13 years I never had shipping damage claim but they didn't care about that.

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  • 2 weeks later...

My impression as a furriner is that the S30 market in the US is too picky and too cheap. This sort of market is really niche, it should be more about supporting those who are prepared to supply a very small market with never any chance that that the suppliers will bring in the big bucks for their trouble and risk. It's not like dealing with a big corporation where  a few dollars here or there don't matter, that is the message which needs to be be accepted by customers who individually need to realise that they are part of a small community and act accordingly.

 

The US is a bit of a stuff up in some ways but by gee there are some individuals who really do go above and beyond :)

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