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| Seibon makes some other cool carbon stuff. How about a 9.4 pound chair? |
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| Sweet knives with ceramic blades and carbon handles. We think these were prototypes. We want some of these. They were super lightweight. |
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| Carbon iPhone cases and key chains were pretty cool, especially since the market is flooded with fake carbon products like these. |
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| Carbon framed sunglasses! The ones without lenses are for hipsters. |
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| Saving the best for last, let's take a look at Seibon's high end dry carbon parts. Seibon's dry carbon is not dry carbon in the way of F1 tubs cooked under pressure in an autoclave. Although this is the ultimate way to make carbon parts, it is not cost effective for an aftermarket part. Seibon's way isn't quite as trick as autoclaved carbon but it is much better than your typical aftermarket stuff. The benefit is that the part is still strong while being light and most importantly, affordable for you! Seibon uses carbon cloth that is pre impregnated with epoxy resin called pre-preg for short. Epoxy has superior structural strength and toughness over polyester resin but is not as crystal clear and pretty. For function it rules however. With pre-preg, the amount of resin used is very precisely controlled and you get just what is needed for the matrix to bond together. Pre-preg can be obtained with different levels of resin, higher resin levels have a better surface finish and are more forgiving for wetting out in the layout process but weigh more. Lower resin levels are lighter but they must be carefully compacted and have a more porous matte surface finish. This dry carbon GT-R hood only weighs 17 lbs and is strong enough to shrug off blows from a hammer without cracking. Look at the detailed vents. The top of the hood is made of three plys of pre-preg. No fiberglass! |
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| Pre-preg comes catalyzed and must be kept in a deep freeze to prevent it from cooking off before needed. The pre-preg is cut and laid in an mold. The back side of the pre-preg is covered with a non-stick plastic film called peel ply which has a bunch of holes in it. A fluffy batting absorbing layer is placed on top of the peel ply. Then the mold is placed in a heat resistant and strong plastic bag and attached to a vacuum pump. The pump sucks the bag down putting a lot of compressive force on the mold and the layup of carbon. This squeezes the layers of carbon together getting maximum compaction and good wet out with a minimal amount of resin. Excess resin is squished out of the holes of the peel ply and soaked up by the batting. The bottom of the GT-R hood shows full detail and all of the OEM bits will attach to it. The bottom of the hood is also made of 3 layers of carbon pre-preg. |
