Flip Front (glass fibre)

Post by **luridhue** » Mon Dec 29, 2008 4:04 pm

The front of the minor needs some work on it after a bump, does anyone have any experience of the glassfibre flip front sold by JLH? How difficult is the fitting? Any problems found with it? How strong is it? Any advice would be greatly appreciated (I really like the idea of a flip front on the minor).

Also, there tends to be a lot of derision on here towards glassfibre body panels... why is this? (ie. what problems are there with gf bodyparts?)

Post by **toginthemog** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 4:13 pm

gled someone else likes the idea I am going for it next years project but like you would like to hear from anyone else who has been tere and done it will be watching your post

Post by **luridhue** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 6:21 pm

Thanks for some sort of a reply, I was sure for a bit that this would die of death pretty quickly!

I have spoke to my dad and found out he had a fibreglass flip front for his mini. His comments on that were that the finish wasn't great and he had to work to get it looking good, the mini needed structural strengthening and the flip front itself needed strengthening. Would be great to hear from someone about whether this has any of those problems?

Post by **Sidney'61** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 7:09 pm

I believe the front wings on a mini are welded on and are part of the structure so to have a flip front it would need structural strengthening as the bonnet is not properly attached at the sides. As the wings bolt on and off easily on the minor they do not contribute to the structural strength so as far as I know no extra strenghthening would be needed.

Post by **toginthemog** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 9:39 pm

The trouble I may have is I have no inner wings so it would be intresting to see how strong they are as I travel the country I tink I may have to call in and see the strenght of the fronts put a picture on dont know if you will see what I mean<br>

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Post by **bigginger** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 10:25 pm

Well, as I'm not there any more, I CAN say that they are superb quality, and as far as I can see will not need additional reinforcement. If you're going to hinge it conventionally, you should be fine, if from the front, get your thinking hat on...

Post by **toginthemog** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 10:34 pm

Thats what I was thinking I will have to put some sort of support frame as it has 2 gas strutts but that wont be hard. The front that is on now is steel bonnet with glass wings and it looks a right mess on the joints