Anyone used real carbon fiber?

[miwashi]

Seems like most people are using rondo or paper towels with resin to strengthen papercraft items, but has anyone tried using real carbon fiber mat and resin before? How would it compare to the other methods?

 

[oysteinhole]

Its 100% the same as fiberglass , but often the fibers are actually more soft than glassfiber when its not covered in resin , so it is easier to use

i have used it many times when making rc turbine jets plane , but not in a costume ....
but offcourse there is one big different when it comes to price .

 

[Recognizer]

Carbon fiber is used when you need high strength + least weight possible, and expense isn't too much of a concern (which is why it's pretty much exclusively used in the aerospace industry). For pep, the little bit of weight it might save you is just not worth the expense IMO. Carbon fiber cloth not only costs like 2x as much as regular cloth, but it also necessitates the use of a vacuum bagging system in order to squeeze out excess resin. Pep also generally requires so much additional finishing work on the surface with bondo that I can't imagine why anyone would bother. It MIGHT be feasible if you're casting from a highly detailed mold, but you couldn't do something like a helmet, and vacuum forming with styrene sheets instead would still be much cheaper.

 

[Tigerblood]

Seems like most people are using rondo or paper towels with resin to strengthen papercraft items...

 

[miwashi]

so for those using paper towels and resin, what is the strength like?

 

[Tim Allen]

Just use matte glass, carbon fiber would be a waste of money for this kind of application, and for those that want to achieve the "carbon fiber" look, there is black weaved fiberglass cloth you can buy that has the exact same look as carbon fiber but much cheaper.