Fiberglass stronger than 28 gauge steel?

[darkbane]

Hello All,

I'm in the process of making a cafe seat and I've made a seat pan out of 28 gauge steel. I'm wanting to mount the batter in the rear of the seat (will post pictures soon). While I'm mocking this up, I placed my batter there, and it's heavier than I thought with a bit of sag. I was thinking that maybe I could make the seat pan out of fiberglass. Would about 4 layers of fiberglass be thicker than the 28 gauge steel?

I'd appreciate any thoughts or suggestions.

Peace

[Jaguarjoe]

28 gauge sheet metal is about 0.019" thick. 4 layers of glass would be many times thicker than that.

[bwringer]

I've never met you, but I'm going to go ahead and assume you're heavier than a motorcycle battery. What's the seat going to do when you sit on it?

28 gauge seems REAAAALLLLLY lightweight for anything except purely cosmetic stuff, and nowhere near strong enough for a seat pan.

[dardoonk]

You might try using a sheet of grey PVC. It's the same stuff they use for pipes, but comes in a flat sheet. I used some for a seat pan and it worked well. I used a one-quarter inch thick panel for the bottom and part of the back, then I used some two-part fiberglass epoxy to shape the smaller details where the seat meets up with the tail-piece. It worked well.

[darkbane]

I wouldn't say I'm a light person. I'm just kind of going through a trial and error process here. I've seen posts of people making seats just by molding a bunch of layers of fiberglass over the frame and and slapping some vinyl on it.

There is cross section on the frame almost directly under my A$$. I figured that would give enough support.

Unfortunately I don't have the luxury of a garage and machinery to do exactly what I want to do. I'm just reading a bunch of posts and seeing how other people are making things work and going from there.

At the moment I just try my first attempt at fiberglassing. I layed about 3 layers or so of fiberglass over my sheet metal. Maybe I'll just leave stuck together for extra strength.

I'd love any other comments or suggestions, keeping in mind that my budget and resource of tools is limited.

Peace