The F1M Forums

Hi Rob,

The colour of a part after the cure depends on the type of resin, fibre, at what temperature the resin is cured, post cure?. and the amount of resin that is still there after the cure. I've seen some parts made of a type of pre-preg which show some of that brown/amber colour after cure.
But the part i took pictures of is made with high modulus M55 fibre pre-preg which doesn't contain a lot of resin. Although cured at around 130'C this type of carbon is more like gray and on the shiny side shows a little like silver shine.

The picture in the link you shared really shows the MP4/1 tub has a peel ply surface, rough and matt, hard to see the fibres, like the peel ply side of my panel.

I think the mp4/6 tub doesn't have a peel ply surface. i think they used a perforated release foil and over that a layer of bleeder material, it looks more like a satin finish so that can be the reason some colour shifting is visual under some type of light because of the reflection of the fibres.



Hein

Hein wrote:The picture in the link you shared really shows the MP4/1 tub has a peel ply surface, rough and matt, hard to see the fibres, like the peel ply side of my panel.

I think the mp4/6 tub doesn't have a peel ply surface. i think they used a perforated release foil and over that a layer of bleeder material, it looks more like a satin finish so that can be the reason some colour shifting is visual under some type of light because of the reflection of the fibres.

That would make sense, there is hardly any use for peel ply on the outer surfaces of a monocoque. And it's a lot easier to remove, and a lot less sparks I've used perforated foil in the past, but I don't have any parts left made that way, and I don't remember specifically what they looked like.

As for the MP4/6 tub, I really need to see some hi-res pictures to judge what production technique was used. I can't seem to find them.

Rob

At this time they mainly used positive molds, today you have more options to do it, but only time period is interesting, nothing else matters.
I believe Steve is right, on pictures the colours are totaly different sometimes, even on the body colours. It`s just up to the modeler which way to go, beeing a bit of an artist and bring in some colours, or going on flat black. Finaly the model counts, not the colour of a single part.

robdebie wrote:

Hein wrote:The picture in the link you shared really shows the MP4/1 tub has a peel ply surface, rough and matt, hard to see the fibres, like the peel ply side of my panel.

I think the mp4/6 tub doesn't have a peel ply surface. i think they used a perforated release foil and over that a layer of bleeder material, it looks more like a satin finish so that can be the reason some colour shifting is visual under some type of light because of the reflection of the fibres.

That would make sense, there is hardly any use for peel ply on the outer surfaces of a monocoque. And it's a lot easier to remove, and a lot less sparks I've used perforated foil in the past, but I don't have any parts left made that way, and I don't remember specifically what they looked like.

As for the MP4/6 tub, I really need to see some hi-res pictures to judge what production technique was used. I can't seem to find them.

Rob

It`s a bit useless knowledge to know how they made it when you don`t know how to replicate it on a model!

plastiksurgeon wrote:I looked at both the video and the gurney flap pictures. Any color you see is reflected light from around the room. Any green you're seeing come from fluorescent lighting.

When I said flat black I shouldn't have emphasized the word flat, It's definitely black with no color, but early carbon did have a semi-semi-sheeny surface to it (almost flat) that reflects colored light from around the room. Proper color balance has been a problem in photography for 100 years. It still is.

The monocoque of the MP4/6 is black.

So to be clear, your position is that the *video* shows color that would not be perceived by those in the room with the actual car. I.E., video manipulates color in the same manner that "flash photography" does.

Hein wrote:Hi all,

Yesterday i made two pictures of real carbon UD (unidirectional) parts wich i make for work (space solar panel substrates).
The shiny one is a mold side finish, the matt one is the peel ply side.
I put a black rattle can cap on it to compare.
So it is black.. but not really though.. also with naked eye it has a sort of glow/silvering to it wich give it a kind of deepness.

Hein

Thank you for taking the time to conduct this experiment! I found the photographs and information interesting.

daveyman wrote:Looks more interesting with a hint of colour and the use of artistic licence.

There is no doubt about that, and that is probably something like the road I will travel in the end.

I do not feel comfortable emulating an appearance that is the quirky byproduct of a "trick" of flash photography though. That doesn't seem "real" enough to me.

If those looking at the real car in real life would possibly perceive differing colors based on differing color sources around the car (lights in museum?) etc., well, that is a bit different.

I never use dead straight black on models anyway as that is too harsh a color for scale modeling in my opinion.

I usually use "NATO black" as my "black" but that varies depending on what I'm doing.

I didn't realize the MP4/6 monocoque was such a can of worms! There are many of these in the world of modeling!

ringleheim wrote:

plastiksurgeon wrote:I looked at both the video and the gurney flap pictures. Any color you see is reflected light from around the room. Any green you're seeing come from fluorescent lighting.

When I said flat black I shouldn't have emphasized the word flat, It's definitely black with no color, but early carbon did have a semi-semi-sheeny surface to it (almost flat) that reflects colored light from around the room. Proper color balance has been a problem in photography for 100 years. It still is.

The monocoque of the MP4/6 is black.

So to be clear, your position is that the *video* shows color that would not be perceived by those in the room with the actual car. I.E., video manipulates color in the same manner that "flash photography" does.

Video and photography both work the same way. The camera is set to a certain color balance. That should be the color temperature of the room or the scene or the subject. When the camera is not set correctly for the color of light in the room, odd colors start to appear that are not really there to the eye. Then there is also the fact that colored lights in the room do reflect off of slightly shiny objects and change their color because of the color reflected. The camera can be set to daylight which will not record properly in a room lit with incandescent (warmer) bulbs. The overall picture will be much warmer and golder. The opposite of shooting outdoors with a camera set for the indoor incandescent lighting will give you a blueish image. And this is only the beginning.
Once you introduce fluorescent light which go Green in photography and video, along with a host of color temperatures in bulbs all over the Spectrum, It's very very hard to get the actual color of something in a resulting video and photograph. When it comes to color, don't necessarily believe what you see in photographs and videos.

Even the settings of your monitor can show different colours in comparsion to the real colour, a lot of pictures look different to what is real. I would not trust or believe in such pictures, i only would use it as a guideline.

Throw in that people see can see colour differently too. There was that thing with the green/blue dress a few years back.