It's not a fun topic to discuss, especially with the extra crazy gas prices that seem to keep going up and up but the prices of carbon fiber parts are rising and titanium seems to be following. While it's never fun to talk about these kinds of trends from a business standpoint, I feel it's important to help customers and just car enthusiests in general be aware of what's going on. (all too often we hear all kinds of rumors for the reasoning behind price trends so it's good to see what's actually going on.

For carbon fiber, it's been an ongoing problem of the supply not meeting the demand. Production isn't increasing and the demand, well, that's going through the roof. Type "carbon fiber shortage" into google and you'll see several businesses dealing with carbon fiber making reference to "the worldwide carbon fiber shortage."

http://www.shopmaninc.com/carbonpage.html <---scary

Up until recently, we weren't seeing this affect the automotive industry but lately, if you look across the board, prices are begining to rise. It's a painful reality until carbon fiber production facilities catch up with demand.

Titanium is no different story...



http://www.bike-eu.com/news/article.asp?id=1962

"The price of titanium has risen by six fold in the past three years, and is showing no signs of slowing down yet."

http://www.janes.com/aerospace/military/ne...60228_1_n.shtml

 

I read somewhere that Titanium alloys will experience a dramatic drop in price soon due to a new extraction process.

Inconel will be the new "bling" material.

 

Let's hope so! Can you post the link where you saw this info on titanium here. (if you can find it)

Inconel is already the new bling for alot of the euro-tuners but if you thought titanium was pricey.

 

One thing to keep in mind is that the carbon fiber material that the military uses is nothing like what is used for the automotive industry. I can only assume that is why the price of a CF hood had not gone up in price in the last several years.

 

The material is different grade but it isn't a seperate issue.

check these articles out:

http://www.fibreglast.com/carbonfibershortage

http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?threadid=50989