Originally Posted by DrivingMissDD
Originally Posted by Tod74
pardon my ignorance....but WTF is a "buck" Is that the mold the body is made from?
That is correct, Tod. It's quite an interesting multi staged process to produce even a single part in 'glass or any composite.
You start with a 'master' or 'buck', which is exactly what you want to reproduce. It is a 'male' and is braced and supported to prevent any distortion. The 'buck' is usually used only once and that is to form the 'female' part of the mold. That 'female' mold is severily braced and built very strong to prevent distortion as it will be used many, many times to produce the actual parts that will be used.
Body bucks are kept as they can be modified to produce a slightly different female mold for a slightly different part. and on and on......
Helped a guy build boat mold this way. I didn't do any of the fiberglass work, I did the framing to stiffen the mold around it. Lots of box tubing a wire feed welder wire.