Car hoods: Carbon Fiber or Fiberglass?

RedVenom48 · Jun 1, 2019

Thinking about an aftermarket hood setup for my 2011 GT500. I was gunho about using engine drop kits for a bigger S/C, but Im not too keen on the idea anymore. Ive narrowed my search to Trufiber's A53KR.

What are some of the pro's and con's of each material for hood use?

svtfocus2cobra · Jun 1, 2019

lexustech48 said:
Thinking about an aftermarket hood setup for my 2011 GT500. I was gunho about using engine drop kits for a bigger S/C, but Im not too keen on the idea anymore. Ive narrowed my search to Trufiber's A53KR.

What are some of the pro's and con's of each material for hood use?

Good carbon fiber seems to look the cleanest after paint with little to no unevenness in the surface, but the difficulty with painting CF sometimes is that it can soak up the paint and clear and so you have to put many more layers down than you normally would and then you will still likely be left with little imperfections that will have to be cut and buffed out. But in the end it usually looks great.

Fiberglass will usually require lots of work prior to paint in order to get a nice clean and even surface so it doesn't actually look like cheap fiberglass underneath. You will have to put a lot of bodywork into it, but in the end you can get a good looking result out of it.

svtfocus2cobra · Jun 1, 2019

This hood turned out great but there is probably 4 or 5 layers of clear on it and then it was wet sanded and buffed, but as you can see on the close up it is still not perfect and has areas where it drank up the paint and clear. With a good experienced painter I'm sure they could get it figured out and the result will be even better than this one.

VRYALT3R3D · Jun 1, 2019

I have a tiger racing heat extracting carbon hood on my '15 GT. I bought it because it weighs the least and the quality and fit and finish was superb.

tvspower · Jun 2, 2019

VRYALT3R3D said:
I have a tiger racing heat extracting carbon hood on my '15 GT. I bought it because it weighs the least and the quality and fit and finish was superb.

View attachment 1576992

View attachment 1576993

Very very beautiful........

tvspower · Jun 2, 2019

I my is BPS race cowl
weighs 11lbs
Great finish, 2nd shop adjusted to fit Perfectly.

Revvv · Jun 2, 2019

svtfocus2cobra said:
This hood turned out great but there is probably 4 or 5 layers of clear on it and then it was wet sanded and buffed, but as you can see on the close up it is still not perfect and has areas where it drank up the paint and clear. With a good experienced painter I'm sure they could get it figured out and the result will be even better than this one. View attachment 1576983 View attachment 1576984 View attachment 1576985

As a guy that grew up in a paint shop, I wouldn't allow those pin holes. The CF would be taped off, and the red would be wet sanded, and then each pinhole would be filled with glaze. Everything would be blocked smooth, primed, blocked again, and then sealed and painted.

The carbon fiber sometimes takes a few layers of clear, then wet sand block everything again, and then spray a couple more coats of clear. Repeat as needed.

It is a time consuming process, and expensive, but that is what is needed with any type of fiber and resin product.

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svtfocus2cobra · Jun 2, 2019

Revvv said:
As a guy that grew up in a paint shop, I wouldn't allow those pin holes. The CF would be taped off, and the red would be wet sanded, and then each pinhole would be filled with glaze. Everything would be blocked smooth, primed, blocked again, and then sealed and painted.

The carbon fiber sometimes takes a few layers of clear, then wet sand block everything again, and then spray a couple more coats of clear. Repeat as needed.

It is a time consuming process, and expensive, but that is what is needed with any type of fiber and resin product.

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Exactly. This example came down to being a case of a painter who was lazy and inexperienced mostly.

Lemmiwinks · Jun 3, 2019

CF is mainly posing.

There is no benefit on using CF hood on your almost 2 ton car.
It looks cool, it's expensive and that about it.

If you wanna be cool on instagram go CF.
If you want to spend the rest of the money on go-fast parts then go fiberglass.

Revvv · Jun 3, 2019

Lemmiwinks said:
CF is mainly posing.

There is no benefit on using CF hood on your almost 2 ton car.
It looks cool, it's expensive and that about it.

If you wanna be cool on instagram go CF.
If you want to spend the rest of the money on go-fast parts then go fiberglass.

It's hard to beat the CF weave pattern. It's gorgeous in my opinion.

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Klaus · Jun 3, 2019

weight is the same. a good painter can do a good job on either. glass is cheaper. probably comes down to style. I went with glass cowl.

VRYALT3R3D · Jun 3, 2019

Lemmiwinks said:
CF is mainly posing.

There is no benefit on using CF hood on your almost 2 ton car.
It looks cool, it's expensive and that about it.

If you wanna be cool on instagram go CF.
If you want to spend the rest of the money on go-fast parts then go fiberglass.

Of course there are benefits to having a carbon fiber hood but it also depends on which brand you select. I bought an aftermarket hood because I was pissed that my 10 month old '15 Mustang started to develop rust/paint bubbling on the hood. Even though Ford covered the replacement hood, the hood still had an issue where it would lift at any sort of real speed(90MPH+.) Pretty common on S550 Mustangs.

The OEM hood that was on my GT weighed 37 pounds. My carbon hood weighs 15 pounds and that includes retaining the windshield washer nozzles. The same fiberglass hood weighs 22 pounds. Not only did I save a lot of weight, it also extracts heat from the engine bay very well and I noticed my temps dropped by quite a bit once I put it on. This is one of the few aftermarket hoods that have been wind tunnel tested and I run my car in a time attack series, so every little bit counts.

Pribilof · Jun 3, 2019

VRYALT3R3D said:
Of course there are benefits to having a carbon fiber hood but it also depends on which brand you select. I bought an aftermarket hood because I was pissed that my 10 month old '15 Mustang started to develop rust/paint bubbling on the hood. Even though Ford covered the replacement hood, the hood still had an issue where it would lift at any sort of real speed(90MPH+.) Pretty common on S550 Mustangs.

The OEM hood that was on my GT weighed 37 pounds. My carbon hood weighs 15 pounds and that includes retaining the windshield washer nozzles. The same fiberglass hood weighs 22 pounds. Not only did I save a lot of weight, it also extracts heat from the engine bay very well and I noticed my temps dropped by quite a bit once I put it on. This is one of the few aftermarket hoods that have been wind tunnel tested and I run my car in a time attack series, so every little bit counts.

I think his point was that a 7 lb weight savings for the carbon fiber hood over the fiberglass hood on a car with a curb weight of roughly 3,800 lb is relatively meaningless.

Revvv · Jun 3, 2019

Pribilof said:
I think his point was that a 7 lb weight savings for the carbon fiber hood over the fiberglass hood on a car with a curb weight of roughly 3,800 lb is relatively meaningless.

If you can remove 7-10 random pounds around the car, those numbers add up. I'm not saying you will shave 100lbs from the car, but every little bit helps in regard to competition.

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tvspower · Jun 3, 2019

for example, add up loss
drive shaft, wheels, kmember, adds up
so my hood is 11lbs, add that loss to the total ( stock hood boat anchor)
I lost approx 60+ lbs running weld rims+ tires on 4 corners
Nothing removed from interior
Every lb counts.....

tvspower · Jun 3, 2019

VRYALT3R3D said:
Of course there are benefits to having a carbon fiber hood but it also depends on which brand you select. I bought an aftermarket hood because I was pissed that my 10 month old '15 Mustang started to develop rust/paint bubbling on the hood. Even though Ford covered the replacement hood, the hood still had an issue where it would lift at any sort of real speed(90MPH+.) Pretty common on S550 Mustangs.

The OEM hood that was on my GT weighed 37 pounds. My carbon hood weighs 15 pounds and that includes retaining the windshield washer nozzles. The same fiberglass hood weighs 22 pounds. Not only did I save a lot of weight, it also extracts heat from the engine bay very well and I noticed my temps dropped by quite a bit once I put it on. This is one of the few aftermarket hoods that have been wind tunnel tested and I run my car in a time attack series, so every little bit counts.

Agree 100%

svtfocus2cobra · Jun 3, 2019

Most CF products you get are going to be better out of the box. Fiberglass tends to need a lot of work, even on expensive kits like Rocket Bunny and Aimgain which I have dealt with both brands. $10-20k kits that require hours of work just to get them to look natural on the car. You dont put in the prep time then you are going to have that same shitty looking glass you see on every import on the street. Carbon fiber typically requires much less work from the start and the products usually have better fit and finish with the lower end ones having issues mostly with the quality of the resin vs the quality of the construction. Then you have the weight savings which will add up if you do a little bit here and there.

Lemmiwinks · Jun 4, 2019

Every lb count.
Sorry, no. I don't buy it on a heavy car like the S550.
Money > performance.

I replaced my steel hood with a fiberglass unit that weighs less than half of the steel one (haven't measured so it's just a guesstimate).
Is my car any faster? No. immeasurable.

svtfocus2cobra · Jun 4, 2019

Lemmiwinks said:
Every lb count.
Sorry, no. I don't buy it on a heavy car like the S550.
Money > performance.

I replaced my steel hood with a fiberglass unit that weighs less than half of the steel one (haven't measured so it's just a guesstimate).
Is my car any faster? No. immeasurable.

No one is saying that just a hood is going to increase performance though.

COOL COBRA · Jun 4, 2019

I went with the Shelby SS hood in fiberglass. Not to be a poser, just that it matches the shape of the car best IMO.
It took the shop some time to get it right for paint but I expected that going in.

Car hoods: Carbon Fiber or Fiberglass?

Let's go Brandon!

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