With a carbonfibre patch and very carefully let it into the hole in the fairing. You use a special film to allow the patch to sit flush with the outside of the fairing. It's not easy and takes some skill and it may never truly be completely hidden and therefore show as a repair, the pattern and weave needs to be matched. However fibreglass and a respray of the panel to cover the damage would be the easy way out.
Yes, I repaired a carbon\kevlar 998RS race seat doing just that and it was very badly damaged. It wasn't worth spending a lot of money on it but as it cost £600 new it was worth saving and repairing for a spare.
I'm not actually too worried. I don't neeeed them, I've got 2 other track fairings I could mess around with if I really wanted to get road legal so I'll just sit and watch.
I want them because I prefer the 998 style side fairings, plus carbon would be cool. Never was keen on the "evo" headlight fairing though. Again, If it stays cheap enough I won't complain
I've got a full carbon fairing that came with my 998S which I bought just over a year ago (I know, I know! before you say it - 998S's didn't come with full one-piece per side carbon fairings - but that's what mine came with! not sure if it's got a genuine Ducati sticker on the inner side of the fairing - I keep forgetting to look every time I take it off :Shamefullyembarrased Anyway, the last owner of my 998 decided it would be fun to drill a 10p sized hole in each side of the carbon fairings to fit bloody crash bungs! horrible! :Vomit::Vomit::Vomit: Soooo, I've just purchased a full set of plastic two piece (upper and lower) fairings from TommyB. My plan is to use them to keep her decent, while I go about filling the holes with some carbon fibre repair stuff before I get all the bodywork resprayed eventually - it needs it because after 13 years and 18k miles, some of the paintwork is slightly crazed and there are inevitable stone chips. I've looked at all the YouTube videos of chappies doing carbon fibre repairs, but I'm not convinced I'll be able to manage a completely flat join around the edges and it will all look flawless after a decent respray! Red, it sounds like you really know what you're talking about! Care to share your experiences or point me somewhere I can watch or read up on before I set off on my road to 7ucking up an otherwise perfectly good pair of carbon fairing sides?...
If you have crazing on the panels then you may have problems anyway as the lacquer finish could be cracked and if it is then the only way to get rid of it is to rub down to the carbonfibre itself. If the carbonfibre gets scratched badly enough then it can show the scratches if you then relacquer it, it's very hard sometimes to rejuvenate a panel it if it too badly gone, that's if you want the carbon showing. Personally I would fill the hole at the back with woven fibreglass, not chopped strand, and then when it is set carefully lay in a couple of circles into the hole from the front. That's if you can but even a small disc of fibreglass weave would help. Fill in the rest of the hole with a decent flexible filler and make sure you rub it back so it is flat but not flat enough to define the edges of the hole. After that prime it with primer filler, guide coat it and then finish with paint and lacquer. A fairly straightforward job but care and time will be required. Allow the primer to dry for as long as you can before rubbing down, several days or more would be good just to check for any sinkage. This company are very good for supplying materials. Woven Glass Fibre Fabric Reinforcement - Easy Composites
You are a gentleman Red. Thank you very much for sharing your knowledge and experience! You are right with the crazing - it is indeed the laquer on the paintwork. I do not have any carbon showing through on the piece of bodywork in question (it's my seat unit) - or at least it looks like it is only the paintwork from my inspection of it. Am I being overly simplistic or just plain stupid if I was thinking about using Nitromors paint stripper on the parts - time and patience and probably many coats of Nitromors of course - but that's the way I was considering doing it. I'm not sure what I should be aiming at, as far as the carbon finish is concerned (I'm planning on respraying when the paintwork has been stripped back) - am I aiming for a smooth shiny 'as new' carbon skin? or does it matter if I rub into the carbon top layer when I remove the paint? When I finally get to do it, this will be my first experience with carbon fibre, let alone stripping and repainting it....
Do not use any paint stripper it could affect the lacquer\resin finish. Carbon needs very careful sanding and if you break through the lacquer it scratches the carbon and then when you relacquer it you will find the scratches show through. The only way to do the job properly is to hand sand it or machine sand it very carefully. You could machine sand it with an orbital sander or a mini sander\polisher. Select the correct grades and take you time, it's likely to be a long job. If you happen to be able to sand off all the paint and just smooth off the lacquer then that is ideal that will leave the carbon in a position where careful masking could show some nice pieces of carbon showing through. Here is a mudguard I did a few years back to give you an idea. This was a very poor quality new mudguard I bought on eBay. It wasn't good enough to mount as it was as the sides were badly finished so I painted it but left some carbon showing through.
No it's from a spray gun using ICI Ducati Red and finished with a number of lacquer clear coats. It's very hard but by no means impossible to get a decent finish using aerosols because of the thickness of each coat is limited. The above work was done outside which made it a lot harder. As was this below, my Ford 1934 3 Window Coupe with 350 cu in Chevy V8, I spent 2 1/2 years and 3,500 hours building this from scratch and did 98% of the work myself . The photo shown was taken for an article in Street Machine magazine. I am totally self taught but have been spraying for many years, and it's saved me a fortune over that time. I purchased a very good compressor way back in 1984 to start spraying with and it is the only major tool I have bought that has paid for itself many times over. I still have the compressor even now and use it for a majority of my spraying. Most of it is about preparation and patience and working on something until it is right. You also need a decent spray gun.
