fiberglass mat v cloth?

[lasteclispe]

hi i just wanted to know whats the difference between fiberglass mat and fiberglass cloth? i saw i post on it a few weeks ago and i did a search but cant find that post.

 

[LightningGSX]

Cloth is a woven fiberglass fabric.Mat is small strands of fiberglass in a binder.

In general, cloth is use for structure and appearance, and mats are used to build thickness.

 

[LightningGSX]

FG mat on the left and Cloth on the right.

 

[lasteclispe]

FG mat on the left and Cloth on the right.

yea i got some of both..thats y i asked. so the cloth is for looks and the mat is for Strength???

 

[LightningGSX]

Kinda.By themselves, the cloth is much stronger.The mat is used to build thickness, and strength/stiffness increases exponentially with thickness.Basically, depending on your project, the outer layers should be cloth, and the inner should be mat.

What are you making? Mold or moldless?

 

[lasteclispe]

first im going to make some tweeter holders. then a want to make a sub box.

 

[devlish]

there are other things you can use for the first layer as well.... fleece, box carpeting, things that stretch well and contour to different shapes. i have a simple "how-to" on my webpage from when i did my sub enclosure. it may help you somewhat. just modify it to your situation.

good luck!

~Kurt

 

[djXternal]

once you get to fiberglassing some you'll soon learn which you like better... i started out with using cloth, but later realized that i like using the Mat alot better than cloth, so now i use only mat unless i have very long straight pieces to glass then ill use cloth

 

[yoshimitsuspeed]

In general mat is usually easier to work with. If you are making something structural you could reasearch strenght properties of each. There are also different weaves, some are only strong in one direction others in both directions, some diagonally to the cloth. Fiberglast.com should have some info on it.
It also depends on what you are doing. The mat turns into more of a moldable mush when you wet it out, this makes it easier to get into corners and over shapes. The weave holds it's shape better so it is harder to work into some shapes but may hold it's own shape better.

 

[Thomas91169]

for my huge back seat project i used the cloth on the outer layers for smoothness, cause its bigger and smoother and easier to work with if youre doing large sections. then i used the matte for thickness and strength. its easy to work with also cause youll want to use littler pieces and overlap them rather than the one big sheet. use pieces about 6"x6" and try to overlap the pieces as much as possible as that creates more strength once its dried.


heres a writeup of what i did to my backseat. any questions pm me. this was my first attempt and it came out great.
http://www.cardomain.com/memberpage/509528/6