How do you refinish faded carbon fiber?

[Cavi Mike]

There's a kid offering me his carbon fiber hood for dirt cheap, $345 shipped. It's in damn good condition but it's faded terribly. I've heard from one person that a wet-sand and clear-coat will bring it right back to life, then another kid said unless you sand all the way to the cloth itself, you can't get rid of the yellowing. I don't want to spend $345 if I have to paint the whole thing black. I actually plan on leaving it unpainted for at least this summer, I'd rather spend my money on other mods and worry about my paint scheme come winter.

[GranMassaX]

CF hood for what car? You can find brand new CF hoods for not much more than that... depending on the make and model though

[Cavi Mike]

For the 328. Parts are a lot cheaper than I thought they would be but it's still a BMW, there's a premium on everything.

[GranMassaX]

eBay Motors: BMW 92-98 E36 325 320 318 Carbon Fibre Hood OEM 2DR CF (item 200108064863 end time May-15-07 13:53:16 PDT)

wouldn't that work? I dunno crapola about ur car


I wouldn't even bother spending almost $400 on a used hood that would require at least $100 in labor to get it looking new again. Actually, don't even get a cf hood at all and save your money

[crazybrew609]

if you want to tire shine makes it look like new again.. it just wears off after a few days.. should get u thru the year fine

[Cavi Mike]

Originally Posted by GranMassaX

eBay Motors: BMW 92-98 E36 325 320 318 Carbon Fibre Hood OEM 2DR CF (item 200108064863 end time May-15-07 13:53:16 PDT)

what that work? I dunno crapola about ur car

He's trying to sell these on bimmerforums, they look like shit. If you look closely you can see how wavy the cloth is. He also won't state who makes them but claims they're "just as good as VIS" which is a flat-out lie. I still have my VIS hood from my Eclipse. It was one of their first hoods ever, 9 years old this summer, and it looks way better than that POS. I couldn't imagine how good their new ones are, rolled edges, c/f on both sides and I'm sure they laid the cloth like it was fine silk.

[Cavi Mike]

Originally Posted by crazybrew609

if you want to tire shine makes it look like new again.. it just wears off after a few days.. should get u thru the year fine

I don't plan on painting the entire thing, I'm just going to do a checkered-flag look over the drivers side, possibly the prop logo somewhere too.

[JClark]

Cant you get a oem-style VIS for like $400 still?

To refinish, sand the clear coat off of it and have a body shop re-clear it.

[Cavi Mike]

VIS hood, OEM style is 500 +150 shipping.

I doubt it has been clear coated otherwise the epoxy wouldn't have clouded.