Well, since nobody seems to be able to get these flares, and I'm looking for a reason to practice my fiberglass and molding skills (and learn some new ones), I figured I'd try my hand at making some bumper flares. I thought maybe if I show folks how I'm doing it (whether it works or not...) maybe I could stimulate some new stuff for our cars.
By the way, this is a work in progress, and I've been pretty busy, so I'm figuring I'm about 2 weeks from finishing. I'll skip all the mistakes and set backs I've had so far and bring you up to where I'm at now.
First off, the famous picture of what I'm basing my flares on.
Ok, so the first thing I did was make a basic template to get a rough curve of the bumper. At this point I was using floral foam, but it's really too porous to be used for this kind of thing. Well, it worked for this step anyway. I assembled the curve with small blocks of foam and hot glued them together. I figured it was easier than trying to trace the curve onto cardboard or something, or trying to do the whole curve at once.
Next, I copied the piece into foam insulation (pink EPS foam). Two pieces gave me close to the thickness I was going for. The yellow foam is a thin piece of actual molding foam that I "acquired" from work.
I glued the pieces together with more hot glue.
I realized pretty quickly that it's almost impossible to get a really good fit with just foam (Believe me, I tried and TRIED). So I figured I'd use expanding foam to fill the gaps. To do this safely, you have to really protect your bumper. Expanding foam would be a really, really, bad thing to get on your paint. I used two layers of painters tape and a generous amount of turtle wax.
Ok, this part took a few tries... I found out that it's easier to spray the foam onto the bumper and then press the foam into it. Don't spray onto the foam, it just doesn't turn out as even. Also don't rush it. Leave it on there for at LEAST an hour... two is better. This picture is actually from one of the attempts that didn't work, but you get the idea (notice a bit of a gap in there...)
Make sure you have a way of holding the foam in place (firmly) because the expansion of the spray foam will force it away from the bumper and ruin things. (Yep, learned that the hard way too...) This is how not to do it:
I ended up piling all kinds of stuff against it to hold it hard against the bumper. When I pulled it off, here is what I had.
With some trimming, you're ready to shape it. I used a hacksaw blade and a razor blade and ended up with this.
After some sanding...
It's still pretty rough, but the foam is pretty soft and difficult to sand evenly. I'm planning to even things out with filler when I glass up the plug later. This is good enough for this stage. Right now I'm working on the piece for the other side. I should have it done by the weekend, and I'll try to glass in the mounting tabs on the bottom during the weekend (when I can let the car sit long enough for the glass to cure). After that, I hope to get the mold made (with the help of an actual fiberglass expert from work) the next weekend, and I'll be good to go after that. I'll take more pictures and add updates along the way. Any questions, let me know.
By the way, this is a work in progress, and I've been pretty busy, so I'm figuring I'm about 2 weeks from finishing. I'll skip all the mistakes and set backs I've had so far and bring you up to where I'm at now.
First off, the famous picture of what I'm basing my flares on.
Ok, so the first thing I did was make a basic template to get a rough curve of the bumper. At this point I was using floral foam, but it's really too porous to be used for this kind of thing. Well, it worked for this step anyway. I assembled the curve with small blocks of foam and hot glued them together. I figured it was easier than trying to trace the curve onto cardboard or something, or trying to do the whole curve at once.
Next, I copied the piece into foam insulation (pink EPS foam). Two pieces gave me close to the thickness I was going for. The yellow foam is a thin piece of actual molding foam that I "acquired" from work.
I glued the pieces together with more hot glue.
I realized pretty quickly that it's almost impossible to get a really good fit with just foam (Believe me, I tried and TRIED). So I figured I'd use expanding foam to fill the gaps. To do this safely, you have to really protect your bumper. Expanding foam would be a really, really, bad thing to get on your paint. I used two layers of painters tape and a generous amount of turtle wax.
Ok, this part took a few tries... I found out that it's easier to spray the foam onto the bumper and then press the foam into it. Don't spray onto the foam, it just doesn't turn out as even. Also don't rush it. Leave it on there for at LEAST an hour... two is better. This picture is actually from one of the attempts that didn't work, but you get the idea (notice a bit of a gap in there...)
Make sure you have a way of holding the foam in place (firmly) because the expansion of the spray foam will force it away from the bumper and ruin things. (Yep, learned that the hard way too...) This is how not to do it:
I ended up piling all kinds of stuff against it to hold it hard against the bumper. When I pulled it off, here is what I had.
With some trimming, you're ready to shape it. I used a hacksaw blade and a razor blade and ended up with this.
After some sanding...
It's still pretty rough, but the foam is pretty soft and difficult to sand evenly. I'm planning to even things out with filler when I glass up the plug later. This is good enough for this stage. Right now I'm working on the piece for the other side. I should have it done by the weekend, and I'll try to glass in the mounting tabs on the bottom during the weekend (when I can let the car sit long enough for the glass to cure). After that, I hope to get the mold made (with the help of an actual fiberglass expert from work) the next weekend, and I'll be good to go after that. I'll take more pictures and add updates along the way. Any questions, let me know.
