Is there a way to bend fiber glass?

[S30_dRiFteR]

I have these sparco fighter seats and the head part (wings i guess) stick out to far. Is there a way i can bring them together w/o cutting or remolding. so far what ive done is juss taken some tie downs and fastened it around the bucket seat in hopes to bend them. so far its been a week and not too much improvement .

[skib]

as far as i know theres no way to soften up FG resin once it hardened to reshape it.

[Six_Shooter]

No, there isn't a way to reshape fibreglass after it cures. The shape must be made when it it is layed up.

[JMortensen]

You could cut the wings off and make new ones and attach them.

[Globerunner513]

you could also just angle the seats inward, so the 'wings' clear the doors?

[blueovalz]

Fiberglass will soften will heat (don't know how much, or at what temperature), but it does somewhat resemble plastic in that once it weakens, it can carefully be forced into simple bend that will remain after it cools down. My experience has indicated there is a fine line between getting more flexible with heat, and acutally burning it.

[AK-Z]

Fiberglass will soften will heat (don't know how much, or at what temperature), but it does somewhat resemble plastic in that once it weakens, it can carefully be forced into simple bend that will remain after it cools down. My experience has indicated there is a fine line between getting more flexible with heat, and acutally burning it.

 

I don't think thats true. With most commercial resins, the curing process uses heat to harden it. Too much heat or not enough of catalyst evenly distributed, it will crack.

[blueovalz]

The reason I said that was because I've made a fiberglass air filter holder that fits between the tower bracing that looks somewhat like a large teardrop. When the engine has been run, and the holder is hot, the fiberglass will bend much more easily than when it was cool, and will retain that bend if allowed to cool under the force of that bend. Because of this, I had to be more creative in the design by incorporating convex and concave shapes that would not bend as easily when warm. The previous design, once it went through the heat cycles was permanently deformed.

 

One thing to think about here is the age of the glass. Seasoned glass is harder than freshly made parts. My understanding is that the resin is constantly curing, even years later. Perhaps the newness of my parts was allowing this change to happen more easily than if the parts were more seasoned.

[kiwi303]

There are two resins generally used in FG work, Epoxy and Polyester resins, Epoxy is stronger and lasts better, and is heat insensitive until it reaches disintegration point. Polyester is cheaper, yellows more with age, is less weather resistant and with give when heated.