I glassed the inside of my hollow wooden fish yesterday, using epoxy resin (a mexican brand) and cotton fabric. can anybody tell me how long do i have to wait until resin is completely hard? today resin is ok, but i dont want to glue the top and bottom of the board to the frame if resin hasn’t completely set. any help will be welcome. thanks in advance. Jack.
If you are going to glue it with more epoxy - From what I have read on the WoodenBoat forum & books on building wooden boats: Depending on the epoxy, if you let the epoxy completely harden (say 24+ hours), you will have to sand the epoxy first before trying to epoxy other things to it. Check out this FAQ: http://media5.hypernet.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=1;t=008298 and the SystemThree company has The Epoxy Book which has all sorts of good info in it. Hope that helps.
there are others here more knowledgable than I, but…
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if bonding epoxy to epoxy (gluing your sides together) it is best to do with less than 24hrs. This enables molecular bond as well as a mechanical bond.
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cure times depend on the epoxy, temp and how well mixed
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should not matter if you close it up, it should continue to cure to full strength
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it seems most hollows have a vent hole, therefore allowing airflow to the inside further reducing the need to wait before closing up {without the vent hole is you epoxy was not nearly cured I supposed it might produce enough heat that could heat the inside and cause presure differential problems - but I doubt it}
good luck
i plan to attach the deck/bottom skins to the frame with heavy duty adhesive from a caulking gun. i think the best is to let the epoxy cure completely, so it doesn’t change the properties of the heavy duty glue. this is my second hollow, i know about vent holes and those things, but is my first time with epoxy. soon i’ll post some pics of my progress. thank you. Jack.
Well said 4est, couldn’t have put it better myself.
JS, before you put the deck on make sure you drill 3/8" holes through the top section of ribs, just high enough to make a notch in the top where you will be gluing.
If you seal all the sections up and you get a leak (godforbid, it’s happened to me!!) you will not be able to drain anything from that area without drilling into the source chamber.
Doing this also equalises the air pressure throughout the internal structure as the only link to the outside is your vent plug.
Show us what you’ve done so far if you can, I’m interested in how you make your HWS.
cheers
Hicksy
thank you hicky, thats a great idea. i’ll be doing those holes today. here you have the pictures, i basically use the jensen’s method of building, but i only use half templates to make the frame. pics 1, 2 and 3 are the frame, number 4, the inside of the bottom glassed with epoxy and cotton fabric.
Looking Very Good JS,
What are you doing the rails with? A suggestion for you, you can take out a lot of weight by putting circular holes (similar to the cross pieces but circles are stronger) between where the ribs touch, maybe 3 per section.
Keep us posted…
Cheers
Hicksy
i dont think to put holes in the sides, because the savings in weight are not significant to me. in the first hollow i made (7’2’’ lenght, 22.5’’ wide) i did those holes and the total weight of the wood drilled was about 1/2 lb. the rails will be plywood-cork, and will be glassed with poly and e-glass. fins are plywood, laminated with chopped strand mat and poly. Jack.
more pics… number 5 is deck glued to the frame. Jack