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The mkiv Supra Owners Club

Blending sideskirts/spats


garetheves
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Have always wondered this, both when i owned a Supra and since.

 

With bodykits and side skirts being "add-ons", surely they are suseptible to a bit of movement/flexing, no matter how well you fix them onto the car. How then, do you blend them in cos surely when they flex the body filler or whatever you use, and paint, will split and the effect of blending will be ruined?

 

Like i said just something ive always wondered, can anyone shed any light on it??

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Mine have been blended for almost 2 years now and are still perfectly blended. That's including the car grounding a lot recently as the suspension dampners have been fiddled with and also the car sitting a lot lower. The front of the sideskirts near the front wheel arch have minor cracks in them but the parts where the blends are look fine still.

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Ordinary filler would crack under the movement, especially if Ro your car has been taking a few "knocks". My guess is they use fibreglass mostly, much stronger and less likely to crack.

 

AFAIK it's fibreglass but i never saw it being done so could be wrong.

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Blending involves fibreglass for adhesion and strength and body filler for finishing purposes and shaping.

 

Bodykits that are blending by just being bonded and then filled, will crack with movement, and most definatly from being grounded, and sink eventualy.

 

I used several different effective methods when I owned a bodyshop.

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I do much prefer the blended look and thats why ive always thought about it. If i ever got another with a bodykit, and could afford a full respray, it is deffinately something i would get done. I just didnt want them to start cracking in a year or so. Piston...That looks class.

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Guest blueangel

It is fibreglass first to bond then when that has set and is rubbed down its a mix of fibreglass and filler to aid shaping and add more strengh and finally a skim of just filler to smooth over, also the rear bumper needs strenghening up so filled with exspanding foam to stop flex as well as the spats and sideskirts. Also along the join of the rear bumper push some fibreglass in to aid adeshion of the bumper to the car.hope that helps

ric

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I do much prefer the blended look and thats why ive always thought about it. If i ever got another with a bodykit, and could afford a full respray, it is deffinately something i would get done. I just didnt want them to start cracking in a year or so. Piston...That looks class.

 

 

Thanks mate.

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Have to disagree with some of these posts.....

 

A polyurethane bonding agent (tiger seal, etc etc) to bond the bodykit part to the car, when that has properly bonded, skim over with filler. Believe it or not, filler has more flex in it than fibreglass and is less prone to cracking.

 

Andy

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hi gaz are you getting the itch again, i'me in the middle of some body mods and have blended the rear spats and side skirts, the spats are pretty easy as they are fibreglass and rigid, they were bonded on with fibre glass and screwed on until dry, the side skirts are a bit more tricky as they are uerathane and much more prone to movement they are stuck on with a Sickaflex type adhesive and then blended using the most flexible filler i could get, if your doing this there are no half measures they are on for good and no going back lol, i got a lot of advise from an automotive paint factor who stocked every type of filler known to man

abs 007.jpg

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when i helped my m8 do his, we screwed the rear spats in, filled over the holes, fibreglassed around the edges for more strength and then used filler to get the finish...for the skirts, we just installed them normally and then fibreglassed over all the edges and corners and then sanded it to get the final shape and filler to fill uneven areas to finish it....looks cool, he did the same for his rear bumper on his other car just fibreglassing over the panel lines filling it, sand down and use filler to get the final shape to blend into the body, in all the finish looked good and had not cracked or anything since then....

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hi gaz are you getting the itch again, i'me in the middle of some body mods and have blended the rear spats and side skirts, the spats are pretty easy as they are fibreglass and rigid, they were bonded on with fibre glass and screwed on until dry, the side skirts are a bit more tricky as they are uerathane and much more prone to movement they are stuck on with a Sickaflex type adhesive and then blended using the most flexible filler i could get, if your doing this there are no half measures they are on for good and no going back lol, i got a lot of advise from an automotive paint factor who stocked every type of filler known to man

 

Hi mate, i got the itch the day he drove it away, but this is just something ive always wondered, as its always been something i would like to have done. Cheers for the info though, ill remember this post if i ever get round to doing it.

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And guess what its all moving and cracking...But i knew this would happen.so when its done its worst i'll redo it using a flexible additive and plastics primer so as to minimise the cracking..although i do know what i'm doing it WILL still crack after time due to movement.

 

should have left it stock but hey you can so you do:p

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