I am trying to take the steps to finish a project I had started some time ago. I have my 5'4'' simmons built out except for glassing and attaching the fins. I can't find the specific information that will help me take next steps so I wanted to reach out. My board seems very heavy and I feel that if I try to glass it myself with fiberglass and epoxy, I will do a poor job and ruin all of my hard work - and add more weight than I'd like to. I am leaning towards sealing it without fiberglass, just epoxy since the deck and bottom are relatively strong and thick. Strong enough for me to stand on the board on dry land. I feel this would be easier for a first time glasser and would be less overall weight for a board I feel is strong. Thinking forward, I didn't know if this would be an issue when trying to glass on some keel fins? does a glassed on keel fin need fiberglass to adhere to or can it adhere to finished epoxy without the glass? Thanks in advance for your help with my question. Josh from Baltimore, Maryland USA
Don't seal it with just Epoxy. Don't do it! You must use cloth. If you do it with just resin I guarantee it will crack, peel and chip away. There is little strength in resin by itself. Since the board is already heavy don't sweat it. I assume it's a hollow wood board? Heavy is something you can't avoid with those. It's your first board, ignore the weight. Wrap that thing in 4oz. You could do really short cut laps. Use Resin Research fast epoxy so the wood doesn't absorb resin and leave you with air in the weave. Easy to use, no VOC's and should give you roughly 45mins to 1 hr to get it perfect. The slow is way too slow, best to avoid it. Just be sure that your board doesn't have little ridges where the planking meets. Get everything flat flat flat. Get a 7" variable speed sander to get the fill coat (aka hotcoat) flat as well. If you can build a wooden board you surely can glass one. Just attack it with confidence and you'll be fine. As far as fins, go with ProBox. Super easy a cheap to install. Check them out you should join this forum http://www.grainsurf.com/forum
I also dont think this is good idea. First off, the fact that the board is already heavy is a reason why one layer of 4 oz cloth and maybe 12-16 ounces of epoxy resin on each side wont be much of an additional weight factor. Second, the resin itself - even epoxy resin - has very little inherent strength. Without cloth, every bump will shatter the resin right through to the wood and i would expect to see cracks everywhere in no time, and issues around the dings soon after. Glass it, and embrace the heft of a wooden board.
Plus, you should throw a lam on there...under the cloth. Rice paper is cheap and you can run it through your printer. First print on printer paper, then tape the rice paper to a piece of printer paper over the thing your printing. Only tape the bottom edge of the rice paper so it will lay flat when you run it through the printer. Give the rice paper a light spray with Satin Clear Acrylic Sealer before you print so not to much ink will soak through. Easy stuff
ahhhh, thanks for the feedback.. the board will be posted later today... below is a picture is UGLY and doesn't do it justice.. a teaser until i get home i guess (for those interested). Below is a pic of the innards from a while back... it actually turned out great. 5'4'' x 22.5 x 3 Shovel-nose.
How thick is the deck ? Resin only works for me all the time I never glass it's overkill, but it depends on how well the construction is, and is the construction done up with white glue or epoxy? It's hard to say for sure, generally the plank on frame boards use glass, but I've seen them without glassing too. The advantages to not glassing is that it's simple and the finish work is way faster. Judging by your picture, the rails looks solid, not bead n cove hollow rails, probably fine without glass, but it depends on the deck thickness. Glassing is always safer I won't deny that. But not needed if the construction is real clean and tight.
