Building my second surfboard with Xps and resin research Epoxy. After topcoating everything seemed perfect, the board looked super glossy and beautiful. I took it 4/5 days later to Paddle on it in a lake and after the swim all the surface seemed kind of sticky and smelling like epoxy.
After the night, kind of the whole board (the top and the bottom around the fins) turned totally whitish… Check the photo!
Sanding it won’t take these patterns away and I was wondering if anyone already had the same experience?
I’m still looking forward to surf it (nice 5’3" retrofish)…but it looks horrible!!
Thanks a lot
Lots of reasons I’m not a fan of epoxy and this is one of them. I had something similar happen to me years ago. I shaped, glassed and polished a board. White deck and green bottom. Was super stoked on how it turned out. When I wrapped up polishing it I walked it down the street to show my buddy who lives five doors down. It was cold out about 25*F. In the 10 minutes that the board was out in the cold the entire glass job, particularly over the green, turned cloudy. It improved as the board cured over the course of the next week. I still notice it but nobody else would. Hammened another time surfing a fresh board in cold water. Be careful of temperature and humidity until the glass job is fully cured.
I think you may have had a bad mix, maybe bad ratio or not mixed thoroughly, dirty mixing cup or stir stick, old resin or hardener.
I say that because you say it seemed sticky and smelled like epoxy.
I once forgot to add hardener and only realized it after I had poured it out and almost finished the lam. I mixed up a second batch and immediately started forcing as much of it into the glass as I could. I let that board sit for a log time before the next steps, and it has funky look. The resin hardened and the board is fine, but it looks funny.
I live in Hawaii and I have a steel shed that I leave Epoxy laminated boards in to post cure. I think it gets well over 100 degrees F maybe up to 120 in there. I know what heat can do to surfboards and resins, but I don’t know what cold does. We don’t get colder than the 60s here.
Yes man I think that might be it. The ratio of hardener and epoxy was good and the mixing too but I think my epoxy was maybe too old somehow. I didn’t see it as the bottle was still full when I did the first top coat, but for the second one (I mean the bottom) I saw that a lot of the epoxy was cristallised at the bottom of the bottle. Might have fuckep the ratio up a bit, I don’t know.
Then I left the board for like 5 days before taking it to the water, but it was in an Alpine lake with pretty cold water. I think it was not cured yet as when I got the board out it smelled and felt weird.
And by the way with the days passing the “cloud/white” part is not getting better, but worse… Also when I took my board in the water I hadn’t sand it at all after the topcoat, might have been better dunno…
Now I was sanding it all day to try to take this clouds away but it’s not working. Any idea to get it off?
If it won’t sand it sometimes means it’s not fully cured. I’d try and leave it in a hot place for a bit and see if that helps. Temps can do wierd things to epoxy.
Most common reasons are humidity, temperature, curing time or when the mix is off.
Most epoxys need up to 7 days at room temperature to fully cure (even if they are hard to the touch after couple of hours or a day)
Some tend to produce amine blush (Resin Research shouldn´t).
But that usually occours quite early (couple of hours). Amine blush is a sticky white layer, but just on the surface and it can be removed with scotch-pads and soap.
If you can´t remove it with sandig, than it´s no amine blush.
My best bet is ratio of / not well mixed or old hardener.
I had two glosscoats of my early board turn milky white after the first surf, because my ratio was of. I was searching for the error like crazy, because I thought I measured correctly. Later I found out there was gummed up epoxy leftovers under one edge of the platform of my scale and that messed with the result dependig on the position of the cup on the platform.
Epoxy going white is usually free harderner that is reacting with H2O.
(like to much hardener or parts of the hardener that didn´t react with the resin part where not properly mixed)
Your pattern is pretty even, which indicates it´s not a mixing problem (which results in streaks or smears of white clouds usually) So maybe the hardener or resin were to old or not properly stored.
I always check twice if I closed the lids really tight on my containers when I´m done with glassing. Especially the lid on the hardener is critical, because they pull moisture from the air like crazy.
I´d say just surf it.
Or if you can´t stand the look, give it a spray.
I wouldn´t bother to much and just surf it.
I agree with Mi-Wi, just surf it, unless it isn’t water tight. I have so many boards that I just couldn’t wait to do a proper finish, so I surfed them. The ones that work well can be refinished (cosmetically) later. For the last several years, I’ve been refinishing boards I like, but never fully finished, and fixing or refinishing boards that are showing age.
I also tend to bust out the rattle can paint when I want to cover up ugly laminations. I’m seeing more people painting their boards these days. Either as an artistic thing, or just to hide the fact that they ride an inexpensive made in China board.
