Carbon panel

tmbg · Post by **tmbg** » Wed Dec 05, 2012 10:48 am

A friend of mine made this solid carbon panel for another builder awhile back, who never used it, so he gave it to me.

I had already cut my aluminum panel, but I cut the AP hole too low, and it interfered with the fwd decks, so I decided to redo it using this carbon panel.

I cut the holes for my EFIS and radio stack, and then went back and cut the hole for my Trio. I did it all on my bridgeport. The carbon dulled the endmill pretty much instantly, and it left a pretty nasty ragged edge, but it cleaned up with a file beautifully and easily.

Every other cut should be a round hole that I can do with a drill, for switches and control cables and headset jacks.

prestwich · Post by **prestwich** » Fri Dec 07, 2012 11:57 am

Sweet! Would love to know how that's done, because I've got a lot of product ideas that I'd like to make out of carbon fibre. Do you need $1m worth of equipment to do something like that? What kind of cutter did you use on it?

Post by **Spike** » Fri Dec 07, 2012 12:54 pm

Now that is pretty slick! That will create a nice cleaning looking panel.

Spike

tmbg · Post by **tmbg** » Tue Dec 11, 2012 2:11 pm

lit up!

captain_john · Post by **captain_john** » Wed Dec 12, 2012 2:38 am

Ian, THAT didn't take you long!

Looks great!

CJ

tmbg · Post by **tmbg** » Wed Dec 12, 2012 8:31 am

I had most of it pre-wired on the bench over the summer. Now I'm just working out power distribution and switches and such.

As soon as I have that mostly sorted, I'm gonna hang the engine and start working on sensor wiring and other FWF stuff. Scary!

Bob Barrett · Post by **Bob Barrett** » Wed Dec 12, 2012 8:24 pm

I wish you were right next door hanging the engine and stuff was fun! Just remember to make all the holes in the firewall before you hang the engine. It is really the pits after the engine is hung! I ended up adding to small holes after the engine was hungand it was not fun!