BMW F800GS carbon fiber mud guard raffle

Ladies and Gents I am in the process of making a carbon fiber mud guard in the best of dirtbike fashion. As this is probably the most labor intensive piece I have built (had to disassemble the entire rear of my bike and pull the gas tank so I can make a mold) I figured why not spread the wealth.

To make this fair for all I will pick a number 1-1,000 and if you are interested in this item send me a PM with your lucky number. The piece will be boxed up and mailed to you free of charge (where ever in the world you live) and include any necessary hardware (4 x M8 bolts and washers). It will be a direct bolt on to the the 4 bolt holes on the underside of your subframe so ensure that these are not being utilized for anything else or this will not be compatible.

I am still in the R&D phase so it may not make it by Christmas but it will be there by mid January. I will conclude the raffle by midnight (EST) Dec 15 and notify the winner via PM where I will sort out their contact information and whether they want it clear coated (for the road snob ) or rubberized (truck bed liner for the off road nut :dllama) or whatever color you want it to be.

Best of luck and happy holidays!

Prepare for a very full mailbox....

So are you entering ebrabaek??

WOW! Very generous of you runnin4melife!! :eek1

Can't wait to see it the pics!

Dave

Hell yeah I'm interested... since the mudsling thread went to hell

Good luck and have fun whilst designing!

Cheers,

Tom - Loutre

If you have a decent relationship with an area dealer, and with all the cracked gas tanks that are getting replaced maybe you could "borrow" cracked one?

I expect they do have to send them back to the fatherland for warranty credit, but seriously it would save you a boatload of work if you could borrow one for a couple days to make your mold, and I would not think the "timing" on their return of warranty parts is not so strict that a few days at your garage would make a difference ....

I'd be signing up for a guard myself, save the fact that I have a Mudsling all installed....

That is a great idea for the tank. The nearest dealer is an hr away and after a few beers the rear of my bike came off pretty easily. The worst part was draining the gas as I had a nearly full tank. I wish I would have thought of that sooner though. Would have eased my suffering

..... I never win anything.... but in all fairness, I think I will forgo the draw, and leave Adam's generous offer open. It will be a fun thread to watch.....

Reminds me of a girl I knew once... after a few beers all kinds of things would come off.

But I didn't know bikes drank beer. :

Hahaha! Well what is the point of having a Bavarian friend if it cannot drink with you? I am off to the local automotive store for now. I am picking up some more fiberglass cloth and resin to finish the mold. It is coming along nicely right now.

I will let my bike know of its philanderous ways

Erling, I didn't win the powerball last night either...

Ha ha.... I no one in my fam played...... I wanted to, but my wife didn't share that thought....

Mold is coming along nicely. This is a step wise build because I have to build a mold to do the layup and then test fit a piece then adjust the mold etc... so it is a bit time consuming. I am taking the week off of this piece to finish my rad guard and will be back to it next week as I am procuring a few tools to assist me in the build. Should have some pics by next weekend

In hopes of making this a great piece I have broke down and bought a vacuum pump and other items necessary to degas the resin so I can make a beautiful (or at least not full of air bubbles) piece. As I am stalled right now just waiting for this to come together I wanted everyone to know that it will be made in a few days. I am almost done with the mold for the layup and will make a quick fiberglass setup and test fit it before I go all out.

Having never attempted this before ... I have a stupid question...

Do you just degas the "cup" of mixed resin before applying it,
or do you apply the resin to the layup and degas the entire part, or both?

JR, we are in the same boat in regards to doing this before. You de-gas before you apply the resin because the bubbles really screw with the layup sometime. Most of them are just cosmetic though but I am hoping that this will make everything look nice and pretty!

Thanks, that makes sense to me and ... only requires a small vacuum chamber
This is something I'm going to want to try in the future and was visualizing the need for a vacuum chamber big enough to hold the finished part ...........

Yeah that would be economically unfeasible for the DIY guy. I googled DIY vacuum chambers and saw quite a few setups. I then followed something very similar to Ebrabaek's which many other people did as well. If you have your 2 stage vacuum pump you are already on your way. I went to goodwill and got a cheap pressure cooker pot and then I had to buy the 1 inch plexiglass online, found a -30 "Hg gauge and will source the brass fittings and tubing from homedepot. All and all I will have about $150 in the whole setup including the purchase of my vacuum pump which I bought off of ebay.

I am pretty excited because the biggest issue I have had so far is the bubbles! It isn't fun when you do a great layup, take your time and everything is going smoothly and when you pop it out of the mold there are 2-3 pock marks from a residual air bubble that expanded to epic proportions. I could get around this by just applying another layer over the top but that is a pain in the butt and requires a substantial amount of sanding.

Sounds good - I have a vacuum pump that I use for car AC work that pulls down very low - I forget the spec. now,
and picked up a small chamber on eBay a while back to try to rescue a cell phone that went swimming ....

Yeah I wish I was closer to my father, he has all the HVAC equipment I would need for this but it is nice to have your own. With the chamber just make sure it can hold up to -30 "Hg. Most HVAC pumps go down to ~20 microns and you will never need that for this application, heck for AC units 350 microns is the target. You should definitely get into this stuff, it is a lot of fun!

I does sound like fun, I think I will ... as soon as I can clear out a few projects on the benches now!

First test subject. If this one works out it will become the mold for the real deal!

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