I took delivery of my mould making and carbon laminating starter kits this week and want to start my first project. I split my rear view mirrors this evening and wanted to ask for advice on how best to get started with this one.

I was going to start by rubbing down the mirror first and smoothing out any imperfections cause by taking it apart, spray it with some paint and polish it up again and finally mount the whole lot on a board and use some card and modelling clay to get it sitting in position and no more gaps.






Few questions I have:
How best do I deal with the lip thats on the cover, should I trim it of and add a small lip after I make the part?
How many layers of CF should I use, is one layer enough? Can I reinforce one layer with the woven glass cloth?

My brother was being more impatient than I and he took the mould of the board but says that the back of the mirror seems to be stuck. I don't know how hard he's been trying to get it out though.

I'll know for future projects to use the spray gun and 2k paint!

If flatting down the part means sanding through the paint down to the plastic, can you get away with polishing and waxing the plastic (along with the rest of the part) and using release agent on it? It doesn't have to be painted to work?