hey i was jus curious since i hurd one of my friends saying a CF hood could crack possibily...so has anyone ever heard on anyone cracking a CF hood or denting it or it chipping or anything along that matter??

basically to put it in a nutshell, are there any downsides to having a CF hood?

 

my friend with a RSX has a VIS CF hood and his is starting to crack a bit

 

that sucks, i dont see it cracking under normal condition though, maybe if something strong hits it or a dumb friend tries to sit on it?

 

I'm also wondering how will these hoods hold up in a front on accident. Will this crease up, shatter into pieces, or will they go through the windshield?

 

carbon fiber acts like fiberglass but CF is stronger.

so in an accident it will most likely shatter...watch for flying pieces.

 

The hoods can crack. Most hoods are carbon fiber up top, but the skeleton underneath is fiberglass. A friend of mine had his Fiber Images hood flip up while driving and smash into the windshield. The top part of the hood that is carbon fiber looks undamaged, but the fiberglass skeleton underneath was cracked pretty badly.

 

HOODPINS!!!

 

He has hoodpins, it's a long stupid story about how someone forgot to put them in that day after a dyno session.

But personally, I've seen so many other cars with carbon fiber hoods that don't need hoodpins because the latch works. It's silly to me why certain companies can't simply make a better fitting hood latch. On this Maxima, the hood was latched but the pins were not in. At about 30 mph, the hood flipped up, that's a pretty bad latch.

 

Yeah...uh hoodpins are very necessary...captive hoodpins are even nicer so you don't forget them in your pocket...

On a Maxima when it flips...it snaps the fiberglass supports and pops inside out over the windshield and roof. The cf itself is definitely tough since it will destroy the windshield, bend the fenders, and suffer only minor cosmetic damage.

Most carbon hoods these days aren't made of structural carbon fiber so they are extremely flexible and they are only marginally stronger than fiberglass. I checked out the stiffness of a friend's several thousand dollar Top Secret carbon hood and you can barely even flex it.

 

Mine start cracking in the right in the front middle section exactly by the latch part. For me keep pushing that section down to shut the hood......and I thought it was only mine but PcGuru had the same crack on same spot.....

 

There used to be a video (in the 3rd gen section I believe) a long time ago of a car running over a carbon fiber hood over and over. I believe it was released by a company, maybe not though. It showed that the hood was unharmed after being run over.

Also, anyone know what kind of resin they use?

 

That video is from the fiberimages website. www.fiberimages.com and it's still on there. I posted a long winded reply to this but im not sure what happened to it. To make things short, a CF hood cannot shatter like glass can, the most likely thing is that the CF/resin surface will separate from the fiberglass underside support structure, ruining the hood, but neither of which are likely to puncture a windshield unless the windshield has already been smashed by the accident in which case getting decapitated by your CF hood is probably not a huge issue. My CF hood did this when I got in a frontend accident with it. I can take pics of it and I've got pics of other CF hoods I've seen smashed from rollover accidents out at the tracks and such.

 

but will it crack from regular closing. how about if you let your hood close buy it's self from a small distance.

 

It shouldn't. If you just accidentally drop your hood and it slams shut, the hood should be just fine.

 

If u let it shut than the square piece next to the metal latch is gonna start cracking.....

 

Me too... my VIS has some small cracks right by the hood latch from the pressure of pushing the hood down to catch the latch.


Deac

 

I had the vis one on my car. And I did have 1 lil chip on it from a rock. You can see the fiber's stick out in the chip. Also I had like a spider crack on the front when I pressed down on it too hard.. Nothing really notieable since the carbon fiber hides it well in camofaluge.


°¨°º©[SuperCharged 2K1 5SPD Maxima GLE]©º°¨°
.::R.I.P. 7/26/03 - WRX STI/EVO VIII Coming Soon...::.
PMPN' 1994 Miata 5Spd - Turbo'd
F/S: Parting Out The Whole Car. Lots of Parts Still Up For Grabs!!!

 

Your question is kinda vague.
is there a POSSIBILITY of cracking? yes...

I had the Fiberimages hood on my maxima and I currently have the VIS CF hood on my 240...
From experience, VIS has much better fitment.
I had the worst experience with Fiber Images' service. but their hood was durable. When I got in an accident, I saw my hood totally crumple then pop back into it's original shape. It did crack down the center.
VIS hood seems much more fragile then the Fiber Images. To answer your question...there's always the possibility of cracking.

 

Hey Danny! How u been?? it's coo that ur still around on org......

 

lol...

I don't post as much like I used to... But I still gotta keep my presence....