Great moments in fiberglassing...NOT

[Tim]

I admit that I got a bit lackadaisacal in a recent minor fiberglass project. I underestimated the difficulty of installing tabbing over these silly ceiling firring strips that I had installed earlier.

Because these are entirely nonstructural, I performed few, if any, of the normal steps involved in properly fiberglassing such things, thinking that it would be straightforward enough to lay wimpy 10 oz. cloth tabbing over the arrangement: no fillets, no super-round edges, and so forth.

I wasn't quite counting on the challenge that the job turned out to be. It turned out embarrassingly badly, I sheepishly admit. The glass just didn't want to lay down the way I had figured it would while planning the project, and I found myself fighting the stuff every step of the way. The resin was extra sticky, the cloth was stringy, and things were generally a mess. I got it all installed to a point that I figured would be acceptable, but it was ugly. Things were not helped by the fact that I had terribly underestimated the time required (since I thought it would be such a breeze), and that it was very late in the day. I'm at my best in the morning, not at the tail end of a long shop day.

The next morning, it was clear that things had worsened overnight. Some places that I was sure I had rolled out nicely had pulled away, leaving large air pockets and places where the fiberglass was not stuck at all to the foam and wood of the firring strips. After some inward discussion with myself, I determined that the job was acceptable for what it needed to be--simply to secure these strips to the hull so that I could eventually screw wooden ceilings to them. Nothing was going to go anywhere, but certainly it was about the worst job of fiberglassing anything I had ever done.

Sanding and some minor reinforcing with extra cloth helped, and since the area will be painted--and then completely hidden from view by the wooden ceiling--it'll be OK. But I am not proud.

I'm choosing to share this experience to make it clear that annoying, irritating, and preventable mistakes happen to everyone, all of us make bad--dumb, really--decisions, and that any project is bound to be filled with this sort of silliness from time to time.

[dasein668]

All I can say is that I sure am glad that that happened to your ceiling strips rather than my whole deck!

What an annoyance! You mentioned sticky... was that due to the fast hardener with the System 3 or did you use one of the other 12 dozen resin combos hanging out in the shop?

[Tim]

No, it was the System Three fast hardener.

System Three: the Goldilocks of resins.

Medium hardner was too slow...brutally so.

Fast hardner is too fast...but the stickiness factor is the real issue.

Guess the "just right" point would be a 50/50 mix of medium and fast.

[dasein668]

Well, after seeing the "nightmare" first hand, I think Tim's description might have been a weeeee bit overstated. No, not perfect. Yes, a few air pockets. But not nearly as bad as he made it out to be!

[David]

Tim, you and Nathan are working in the same shop AND still talk boats here? Must be one cold winter up there :)

[Tim]

It's all about boats, after all! Can there be too much talk?

That said, it is frigging cold, for sure! But I'm not complaining; I actually like it.

[dasein668]

Well, when you consider that for weeks on end we've each had earplugs in and respirators on while we grind our brains out, there just isn't that much talking going on at the shop!

[Figment]

Tim,

You're having problems with S3 fast hardener not curing hard enough? What's your shop temperature?

[dasein668]

Oh no. It cures plenty hard. And plenty fast at Lackey shop temps?60s. By sticky he meant sticky after about 2 seconds of trying to roll it out becuase it is already starting to kick.

You've only got about 10 minutes or so before it really starts to get too sticky to roll out well.

Glassing my whole boat with that stuff was a real treat. Though we only had one pot go up in smoke...

[Tim]

No, it's the medium hardener that takes forever, as I said above.