Does anyone have any super tips on getting the hard edge at the tail right first time when hotcoating? I use the raised tape method where it creates a dam for the resin to give enough extra resin at the rails to sand.
But 80% of the time i still need to go back and touch up the odd bit where the tape went wiggly or some other reason that just causes enough imperfections in the edge to have to go back and touch it up again. It would just save me quite a bit of time getting it 100% first time.
keep the tape tight, if its flexing and wobbling, you have 2 potential issues, either A its not tight or b its too high off the board and allows the tape to wobble it only needs to be an 1/8 or so up off the board.
Thanks aqua, thats pretty much what im doing, the result is ok but almost always needs a touch up which loses me time.
Do you hotcoat deck side or bottom side first? What width tape do you use?
Kinks in the tape can make it wiggly i found.
I pull tight before the fin where the rail tucks then you can ease off around the harder back section as you dont want the resin to come inwards from the tape being too tight if that makes sense. I use one inch tape the cheap tape is fine for this job i rekon.
In oz we paint the bottom lap grind it smooth, then paint in our edge with laminating resin. Hotcoat bottom first then deck.
…why do first the bottom hot coat? you are flipping the board more times than needed and put another possible variable that is to have a too dry deck…
-lam the bottom, flip and lam the deck, hot coat the deck (and laps) (sand laps), (cheater coat) put the fins (glass ons), hot coat the bottom.
Back in the day it wasn’t unusual for a glasser to laminate the bottom, flip, then laminate the deck. For the deck lam, the tape line on the bottom would be the usual 1 1/2"-2" from the edge in the nose but would taper so that 18" or so from the tail it would run right to the edge. This allowed the tail laps to simply hang until they cured and then they’d be sliced off with 1/4" or so hanging from the bottom… after hotcoating, the hanging edge would get feathered so it was left nice and sharp. It left an arguably weaker bottom rail in the tail (no overlap) but worked great for creating a sharp edge.
I generally now use two layers of tape, one that goes around the entire board at the rail apex but very close to the rail edges at the tail (starting where you want your hard edges to start ), then another layer just to create the dam of resin (raised tape method) .
I’ve had some wiggly tape problems at first but since I have been doing it like this it never happened again.
But I am far from being an expert, I am maybe just a fool and I just wasn’t lucky/attentive enough to details to pull it off the first times 
…hello John, sometimes that method is used when you add a tail patch or in the past with thicker sheets of glass.
the raised taped up edge is a pain in the A…extra time to tape up and again to sound in…I am gonna shape the edge in more prominently at the beginning and spend the time with the edge in the lamination,and see how that works…
There is a reason it’s done in the hotcoat. You have to wrap glass around your rail. Lots of potential for air bubbles if you leave it sharp. And as stated above, just pull the tape right ( not too tight, not too loose) and you’ll be good.
Positioned wetted rovings do the trick too…before the hotcoat.
Thanks guys, its given me a few little things to try and think about, i almost have the hard edge perfect but its not perfect enough, ilI’ll try pulling the tape and if thatddoesn’t do it I’ll think about a few glasd rovings. I was hoping there would be a magic bullet but obviously its just a fine line of getting the raised tape method 100%
I do my edges with lam resin before the hotcoat. I’ve tried the method of doing the tape above the edge while doing the hotcoat and alway had the same issue or not having enough edge to feather in. Now I do it at the same time I’m pasting the deck lap on the bottom and before I do the deck hotcoat. With bottom faced up, I tape the edge area up to about 2-3" past where the front fins are going. Place the tape just above the edge and taking my fingers and pulling the tape away from the edge to make a pocket along the edge/rail to fill in with resin. That pocket allows you to have the extra resin in that area so when you do the deck hotcoat it will be thicker in that are to feather in. I mix up enough lam resin to fill the pocket then after its filled I put a little bit of wax/styrene (wax solution) in the left over resin to paste the lap line on the bottom. Some people might say don’t do that but there’s no issue with mixing wax solution into the resin a few minutes after the hardener (MEKP) is already mixed in. Atleast I haven’t had any and I’ve been doing that for a while now. After the edge resin is cured I flip the board, tape it off and hotcoat the deck. When I tape for the deck hotcoat, I make sure that the tape at the tail edge is just enough to hold onto the board so the hotcoat covers it. Then flip again when cure, sand the lap on bottom flush and hotcoat the bottom, again tape past the edge. Hope that makes sense. There’s a step by step process of this method that I found somewhere but I’m not sure where that is. Will try to track it down.
Here’s a drawing of the pocket I mentioned.
I agree with Wildy, rope 'em before the hotcoat. This provides the sharpest, strongest edge. Break the sharp rail edge on the shape to provide enough surface for the roving, cover and smooth out / blend with a narrow strip of 4 oz over (later sanded away). Like doing glass-on fins, working with roving is all about timing and getting the air out and this is difficult for many people (was for me). But once you get it down the results are worth it.
A picture may be worth a 1000 words. Tape dam for hard edge on EPS/epoxy recent build.