Guess I should have made my intro shorter and got into the detail in this section but, since I've now posted it...

Bit of an update: I'm sure it'll come as no surprise to the more experienced forum members that the second-off didn't work out quite as well as I'd hoped. The "inner mould" pressed the lay-up into the mould, proper in some places but there were two areas where it pulled the layup away from the mould sufficiently to produce a void between the CF and the mould. Although the Kevlar does make the whole body far more robust, on balance, it's a bit of a pain to cut it, etc so I'm not likely to use it round the edge again. Think I'll go back to a straight 2-layer lay-up and make up a spare in case the first one gets trashed. Might add some strategically placed Kevlar tape after I've de-moulded.

I am also making RC bodies amongst other things... and after MUCH deliberation I ended up taking that route. With the cost and effort of it all I deemed it worth it. 

TBH, this particular vehicle is more experimental than anything else. It's only about 22" long with a 1/14 scale chassis. Should be good for about 100mph but I'm using several aspects of this project to learn about construction and control techniques for a faster vehicle. Worth noting that the current world record is over 170mph.