I've made the acquaintance of a guy who makes bespoke carbon fibre parts through a motor cycling forum I also frequent. Most of the stuff he does is for motorbikes, but I asked him tonight if he would consider tooling up for a carbon fibre cam belt cover for Betas. This was his reply:
"I could yes... BUT it needs to be in a good condition and clean as possible. I could get it sprayed with a resin coating to try and refine it to look new again too..."
Richard made a batch of replica motorcycle fuel tanks for Aprilia Falcos, finished in a special resin that was warranted ethanol-proof. The quality was superb and everyone was delighted with the quality and price. Here's a link to one of the threads on the forum that has some photographs showing the end product:
http://www.ridersite.ws/rs/viewtopic.php?t=12812&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=30But as stated above, he would need a cover in a condition as near to new as possible to make the mould off. Any imperfections are embedded in the mould and get replicated endlessly. There is also the question of which variant of the cover to use. I've seen differences in specification from a sample size of only three, so I shudder to think how many variants there are out there. Can anyone help on this?
This post is really just to see if there might be any interest in taking this further and getting a sample cover to Richard so he can make a guess at prices etc. Incidentally, the cost of the fuel tank in the link I've posted were £800 each, which considering the work and materials involved was a real bargain. That was for the first 'committed' batch - later batches were more expensive, rising to £950 for the most recent batch. A cam belt cover would be a much simpler proposition and could be made as a single piece, which would reduce the price substantially. However, as with the tanks, a minimum order would be required to justify tooling for the mould. I'd imagine a minimum order would be around 10 units - that's what was agreed for the bike tanks.
Let me know your thoughts.
