bubbles in the lap

General Discussion
1

I have  only glassed @ 10 boards over the last 10 years and I always get bubbles on the deck where the lap from the bottom meets the glass on the top. It just happened again? Before I go further I'd like to get rid of them , even though they'll be under the wax for the most part. How can I get rid of these bubbles?

1. hotcoat and then sand them out

2 sand them out first and then patch and hotcoat

3 cut them open and push resin into them

4 hide them by spraying color on them

5. any better suggestions

2

styrene is your best friend with bubbles. but make sure you grind your laps down really well to prevent this in the future.

3

Drill a small hole and fill it up with a dab of resin.

4

as A2tall says

prep your lap better

was this a freelap?

you could get bubbles if a cut lap wasnt leveled out or basted

5

They were free laps, and I get alot of strings. I guess I do need to gring them down more, I was afraid of hitting the foam.

 But right now my concern is how to try and fix these. I haven't put on a sand coat yet, I'm thinking about  sanding the bubbles out and laminating another strip of glass along the rail if the foam is exposed, then putting on my sanding coat. Hopefully then it won't look like a patch when I'm done sanding. Or I could do the sanding coat first and sand out the bubbles, then patch, sand etc. The first way sounds cleaner and lighter but I'll be sanding laminating resin. Theres too many to just pop a few holes in them and fill em up.

What do you think?

6

You said; "I always get bubbles on the deck where the lap from the bottom meets the glass on the top."  First off, you need to fix the problem in the first place.  Are you really glassing the deck first?  You should always do the bottom first then the deck.  If you are getting bubbles and glassing the bottom first, you need to watch your timing, and as the glass just starts to go off, run your thumb or squeege over the rails in one last pass.  Pros try to get a lap with no drips on the laps.  If you get bubbles on the lap over foam, try to sand them down without hitting the foam (harder than it sounds) then add a patch and feather it in before you glass the deck.  You didn't say if you were using epoxy or pu/pe.  The above applies to pu/pe construction.  Epoxy is slightly different, and if you are getting bubbles, there are other things that could be going wrong.  Just my 2c....

7

Try drop resin on the blank before the fabric, so when you put the fabric it will be full of resin…

 

rgrds

8

Start doing cutlaps.Cutlap every board you build until you’ve perfected it.Then keep doing cutlaps.I can clean up a cutlap faster than I can a freelap

9

    Howzit modernreptile,Listen to kensurf,he knows whet he's talking about. as far as free laps go they are by far the easiest to do but you have to get it down so you don't have all of those strings so don't wrap the rails by squeegeeing them so far in that they drag the weave with them. Learn to wrap the rails so you are running your squeeggee with the rail and not across it. Aloha,Kokua

10

I think whats happening is he has dry spots in the bottom lam on the deck rails

and he's not catching them before doing the deck lam, therefore locking in air

make sure them laps are wet before you pin em down!

11

I originally learned by doing cut laps years ago and now have been trying free laps. I'm sure my problem is not prepping my laps better. And since I only glass my own boards I only do a board once every 2-3 years so I'm not learning fast.

But I'm still looking for the bestway to fix these bubbles. I'm trying to salvage my mistake and end up with a board that has a decent looking glass job when I'm done.

 I did the bottom first and then the top and the bubbles are along the lap on the top. I think I'm going to sand them open, lay a patch over them(maybe along the whole rail for added rail strentgh and so it doesn't show as much when I'm done), then hot coat and sand everything.

Any susggestions on that? Thanks

12

razor them open and fill em with resin

any pics????????

13

Just for everyone's knowledge, I sanded out the biggest bubbles, then sprayed more color on them and the small bubbles which I just left alone, except for the color. Then I layed up new rail laps to cover all of it.

It worked! You can't tell there were ever bubbles. Now I'll apply the sand coat, sand it and it will be a good looking glass job. A little heavier maybe but the rails will be strong.

Thanks for all your help, it will guide me when I make my next board.