Fiberglass sucks, but when you have no other options, you don't really have a choice about what sucks and what doesn't.
I've seen this car before. He did a decent job of it, but I think that it's WAAY too much work to be worth it. Unless you're unemployed and just sit around on your duff all day, I think the effort is way too great.
The best thing to do would be to get a large piece of heavy foam and carve that up for your template. You then put the fiberglass netting over the foam, put on the fiberglass resin, and let it dry. Then you do that about 10-15 more times, so it gets progressively thicker and stronger. Once you've gotten it to a point where you're happy with the way it looks, use a reciprocating saw to cut the major portions of foam out, then use terpentine or a similar chemical to dissolve the rest of the foam. Once that's done, hose it out really well, and make sure you have all the foam and terpentine out. To prep it for painting, all you need to do is take a fine grit sandpaper (400+) and lightly sand it down, making sure you smooth out any inconsistencies or rough spots. Get it painted, then figure out a way to bolt the brackets on.
You can buy fiberglass netting and fiberglass resin at West Marine or any other marine supply store. It's two part resin, meaning you need to mix it in almost exact quantities. If not, you could have problems, ie- too much hardener, dries too quickly, can't shape or mold, too little, dries too slowly, takes days to cure. It's really a pain in the a$$ to work with, but once you get used to it, it's not all that bad. Just make sure that if you ever do use it, that you're in a very well ventilated area and that when sanding it, you wear gloves and long clothes, as well as goggles. I got some fiberglass in my skin once, and it's not fun. It takes about three days for the skin to push the fiberglass shards out, and until then, it itches like a bastard.
If anyone has any more questions regarding HOW to fiberglass, or what you need, PM me...
JR
