What is the proper way to work with fabric seams?

[system]

What is the best way to work with fabric seams.

For example, I have an object that is longer than my fabric and I would like to join two pieces of CF fabric. I know there will be a visible seam, but what is the best way to make it as clean as possible?

Thanks!

[system]

Hide/place your seams where they will be less visible. In corners or on the back end of curves is ideal. This is a lot easier to do with pre-pregs. For flatter pieces where long pieces are required, you could also try getting a longer piece and orienting it on a bias.

Example: If you have 36" (1yd) of 50" wide cloth and lay it on the bias (diagonally), you get 61.6" of width from corner to corner. This is where all that math we learned in school comes into play. You need to find the hypotenuse of a triangle (half the cloth to get the diagonal measurement of your cloth) using Pythagoras’ Theorum: a^2+b^2=c^2, or in this case:

(Breaking it down so anyone can understand the math)
36^2 + 50^2 = x^2
3636 + 5050 = x*x
1296" + 2500" = 3796"
square root of 3796" = 61.6"

Of course, that doesn’t work when both your length and width are larger than 50" and this gets expensive for large pieces, but when only contiguous cloth will do, charge more! 8) And I think bias, especially with certain weaves, is really much prettier than just standard orientation.

And welcome to one of the biggest rules of fabrication. ALWAYS buy more cloth than you need. Left-over cuttings are much easier to work into another project than trying to squeeze a project into too little cloth.

[system]

ah there ya go… what Joseph said^2

[system]

Hide/place your seams where they will be less visible. In corners or on the back end of curves is ideal. This is a lot easier to do with pre-pregs. For flatter pieces where long pieces are required, you could also try getting a longer piece and orienting it on a bias.

Example: If you have 36" (1yd) of 50" wide cloth and lay it on the bias (diagonally), you get 61.6" of width from corner to corner. This is where all that math we learned in school comes into play. You need to find the hypotenuse of a triangle (half the cloth to get the diagonal measurement of your cloth) using Pythagoras’ Theorum: a^2+b^2=c^2, or in this case:

(Breaking it down so anyone can understand the math)
36^2 + 50^2 = x^2
3636 + 5050 = x*x
1296" + 2500" = 3796"
square root of 3796" = 61.6"

Of course, that doesn’t work when both your length and width are larger than 50" and this gets expensive for large pieces, but when only contiguous cloth will do, charge more! 8) And I think bias, especially with certain weaves, is really much prettier than just standard orientation.

And welcome to one of the biggest rules of fabrication. ALWAYS buy more cloth than you need. Left-over cuttings are much easier to work into another project than trying to squeeze a project into too little cloth.

Awesome! Thanks for the pointers.

I’m planning to laminate the front splitter on my E36 M3…I just love the look and don’t want to fork over the $$$ for aftermarket products and I will be proud if I can do the work myself.

Thanks again!