Today was an epoxy day! Other than continuing coating full sheets of plywood destined to be bunks two new techniques were used today, a) to build up fillets in difficult areas and b) to add biaxial glass to bulkhead to hull sides. My work from yesterday had not fully cured over night as the temperature hovered around freezing. Heating the shed would be pointless but as I was coating the bunk boards in the garage, I could add some heat there. To do the fillets I built up the area I wanted to fillet with modeling clay then poured a runny mix of epoxy and wood flour into these molds. Hopefully removing the modeling clay will not be too big a deal. I've read about doing this but this is my first shot at it. Glassing the bulkheads to hull sides was more exciting. I made up a pre-preg rig by using stiff plastic sheeting taped to a board and then using a rubber roller of the type used for installing linoleum flooring to roll the resin into the cloth. Once the cloth was saturated, I would peel it off the plastic sheet and then carefully install it over the joint smoothing it down with my fingers. This worked really well (see photos). Tomorrow I will coat the cloth with additional resin after I cut any roughness or loose fibers out.
Tuesday, October 31, 2006
Today was an epoxy day! Other than continuing coating full sheets of plywood destined to be bunks two new techniques were used today, a) to build up fillets in difficult areas and b) to add biaxial glass to bulkhead to hull sides. My work from yesterday had not fully cured over night as the temperature hovered around freezing. Heating the shed would be pointless but as I was coating the bunk boards in the garage, I could add some heat there. To do the fillets I built up the area I wanted to fillet with modeling clay then poured a runny mix of epoxy and wood flour into these molds. Hopefully removing the modeling clay will not be too big a deal. I've read about doing this but this is my first shot at it. Glassing the bulkheads to hull sides was more exciting. I made up a pre-preg rig by using stiff plastic sheeting taped to a board and then using a rubber roller of the type used for installing linoleum flooring to roll the resin into the cloth. Once the cloth was saturated, I would peel it off the plastic sheet and then carefully install it over the joint smoothing it down with my fingers. This worked really well (see photos). Tomorrow I will coat the cloth with additional resin after I cut any roughness or loose fibers out.
2 Comments:
To get the epoxy to cure, why don't you cover the hull at night and put a heat sourse (lightbulb, or small electric heater) inside?
Because I have a history of catching things on fire!
Post a Comment
<< Home