Glassing Methods

General Discussion
1

Hi Guys, 

I know glassing is a big field, many different technics and ratios…

In a recent meeting with friends I saw one guy cutting the fabric making a roll in the middle and droping the resin on the blank bottom, 
squeegee … and then opening (unroll) the fabric and droping a litlle more resin a squeegee again… do you agree with this technic or prefere to place the open fabric over the blank and then drop the resin?

Also he did something different on the deck first used the same technic (resin on the black and after unroll the fabric (one layer) waited to become dry and then apllied the second layer… 

After dry the second layer he did not sand, he made a very thin hot cot waited to become dry and then sand  the board… fixed the fins plugs, apllied the gloss coat and sand again and polish…

Would appreciate if someone could reply. I noticed that his boards are much strong and it makes me to think about it.

 

Reagards to all!

 

 

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fabric before dropping resin

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3

…hello,

occurs that in hand lay up there s techniques that belong to different labors…

In this case was “imported” to surfboard making due to the use of heavy fiber glass and not premium quality as some brands that you would find now.

Saying that, I recommend that you think in the concept of the board you ll glass: what type of board, for what, etc. If you use lighter density foam and 4oz silane fibers , better go with the conventional way. Not necessity of the other technique.

About the deck technique, is not so good, more resin, not the best bond between the layers.

4

might have been putting down ricepaper logos under the glass?

5

I had a great discussion about fiberglass at one point.  At the time, he was laying out the glass on a nice looking longboard and he really took a lot of time smoothing/aligning the fibers of the cloth. 

The discussion was mostly about aligning the fibers in the fabric.  The whole idea was to align the fabric so that when the resin glues the fabric to the board that it doesn’t warp the board. 

There is probably a lot of wisdom from that conversation that I didn’t understand or was lost because I have slept since that point…

I have always tried to smooth out the fabric to make it smooth and where I want it before putting resin there - it is kind of a zen point for me…  After that conversation, I make sure that I really look at the glass to see if it looks aligned and smooth before I glue it to the blank. 

Anyway, I don’t think that it is worth the potential problems to try to baste the blank and roll out the glass, etc.

6

So overkilled.  Using the method described you will get poor saturation..

7

I know one professional glasser who does something similar.  But you gotta be fast, and have the right set up. 

He wets out the blank, before he pulls the cloth off the roll.  The roll of cloth is hanging on the wall, right at the end of the board.  Pour the resin on the board, and quickly pull the cloth onto the board.  You are letting the resin saturate up through the cloth while you take your scissors, and trim the excess.  The plus that you don’t have to work the resin as much as if you poured it after the cloth was layed out. less squeegee work.  No chance of dry spots.

I’ve never tried it myself. but the pro glasser who told me about it said it was his prefered method.

8

Hi Felipe,

 

     As you say there are many ways to just glass a board.  Doing a superior job is the hard part, doing it

consistently is even more so.  I read your post and I have to wonder if you mean PU or EPS blank,

Epoxy or Polyester resin?  There is NO right answer, however, right around when Clark closed down,

we came across a guy from Brazil who had been doing the technique you describe for years and there

is a group of builders who continue to do it here in southern California today.  Although we did not measure

it, we found the boards (EPS/Epoxy) seemed to be quite a bit lighter, stronger and have more clarity through

the glass.

 

     In my opinion, the “wet blank” technique is probably generally better for epoxy resin rather than polyester,

although we do both when needed.  

 

     Also many circumstances will facilitate a wet blank method, such as multiple layers while using

epoxy like a deck lamination, or working for carbon graphite, or non-washed fabrics.  Doing laminations

like this with epoxy (over PU or EPS) will get a more clear, lighter and stronger glass job.  The negative

thing is that glassing this way is harder, you can slip your rolled cloth, and handling a wet board is hard

at first.  If you are any good with your hands, you will figure it out error-free.  We use “variations” of the

wet blank method for airbrushed boards that may otherwise off-gas (“crystalllize”) even with polyester work.  

     If you are talking about epoxy, the sanding comment alludes to “blushing” but I am not clear on

it.  A lot of the epoxies we use here are not prone to blushing and there are other techniques you 

can use to get perfect, gloss-coat-like, hotcoats with epoxy.  We do not however use the method

for standard “production glassing.”

     I have supplied the original link on the topic of “Glassing both sides of a board in one session”

which also uses pre-wetting of the blank and having the cloth saturate from “the inside, out.”

 

http://www2.swaylocks.com/node/1025852

 

Hope this helps,

George

9

Laminating over fiber is an effective way with fast resin and open woven fiberglass. Put fiber on resin is THE industrial standard way for lam in mold. It’s the only way to laminate effectively tight woven fiberglass and i density stitch fiber. With epoxy it’s a far better way for me. I lam more than 60 boards this way with no problem.

Sorry for my franglish

10

Thank you all guys for the comments.

I was talking about poliester resin not epoxy…sorry for letting this detail.

I noticed that his boards are stronger but heavier, the blank absoberd part of the resin. 

Of course this technic is a good one when you are putting rice paper, but he does it always.

I liked the method because there were no bubles, no missing part, you place the fabric, cut, roll in the midle and then start dropin resin.

… Another thing is that he just sand after the first hot coat. I liked it…easier 

About the two layers on the deck I agree that put both together is better…but just one will turn the rail the second does not, right?

I never tryed to airbrush the blank, only the resin…so I can not say anything…

 

Please let keep this discussion open…this weekend I will glass a board and will try the one method on the bottom and other on the deck…let see the mess…rsrsr

 

 

 

 

11

 

whats up bro, are you from brasil? 

I´m no professinal but learned how to glass with a brazilian pro glasser and if you using brazilian materials there is other details to pay attention than the method you mentioned. The cloth quality and resin thinning ratio (with styren) is very important. Using brazilian cloth you have to thin the resin a litle bit, something like 10% to saturate the cloth completely. This will make your glass job litle bit weaker than the job done using imported cloth(hexcel) with ‘‘thicker’’ resin. The thicker the resin the stronger the board.

My opinion is that if you do a GOOD conventional glass job with good saturation and no excess of resin you can get a light and strong board…also how you apply the hot coat and how you sand it will be also very important. 

Is good to understand that is not the method or one part of the process that make a light and strong board…but the whole process…every step must be done with patience and attention…I think thats the biggest secret…have your mind calm and do every step with love…doesnt matter the time it takes…

When you start doing a clean and tight glass job I think is time to change methods so you can see how better or worse it is…I say this because if you go wrong with any other part of the proccess , like sanding hot coat, or leaving too much resin, for exemple, will be hard to know what was affected by the method in the final product.

 

ps. when glassing the deck, the fisrt layer you cut at the rail apex, and the second you cut the normal lap…Your rice paper logo goes in between)

 

abs

 

 

12

As lemat says, I’ve found that the best result for PE resin and typical fiberglass (E/S, volan, etc.) it’s best to lay the cloth down and wet out the cloth from the top. The exception for me is when using expensive epoxy, and trying to minimize waste, I’ll fold up the lap, wet the foam from the apex down with a chip brush, then flap the cloth back down and wet out the flats as normal. This minimizes waste dripping of the rail when wetting out the laps and tucking them under tight with not much excess to pull out.

But with other tightly woven (or stitched?) fabrics, like nylon and the like, it’s best to roll up the fabric exactly like you show in the diagram, and wet out the foam. Then lay the fabric out, smooth out any bubbles, then lightly wet out the top of the fabric, pull out any excess, and get the lam down tight and flat. I’m saying nylon because I recently did a full deck inlay with a product called Inlayz, from OZ, that felt, looked, and smelled like nylon, but I don’t know for sure what it is. But I can say that it would definitely NOT have saturated well with PE resin had I done a traditional lam technique. I know this because I experimented with the off-cuts. Best result was the “roll it up to the middle” method as you showed, wet out the foam evenly with a roller, roll back down the cloth, then work the top of the lam with a spreader (not a thalco squeegee).

13

Hi,

I see you know Brasil, write BRASIL with S intead of Z is nice. Also ABS in the end…very cool!

 

Thank you for the hints, I finished the board and I can tell you that I will start doing a mix of both methods…

 

I will start with a roll like in the picture and wet only the rails…it prevented bubbles… was good…I noticed it because the bottom was perfect also the rails…

 

The rice papper (bottom and deck) I used to aplly on the blank and never had problems (aslo carbon fiber)…do you do different?

 

Di you sand before the hot coat? I like removing only the extra fabric, but I do not sand with machine. How do you like?

 

10% of styrene i was only using for gloss coat, for fabric I was using 7%. As i like UV catalizer I do not need to have hurry and I can wait to saturate.

 

I will try next weekend 10% for the fabric…

 

Please reply when you can!

 

Best regards

 

Abs 

 

 

 

14

…hello man, seems that you have a mistake with the glassing process.

You always sand the hot coat, you do not sand the lam coat, no matter if its bottom or deck; only sand (sometimes) the ridges of the laps. Then hot coat, then sanding steps. After that, the finish coat.

Also, the styrene that the other member say is only styrene monomer, without wax (paraffin) to thin the resin.

I the hot coat (filler coat) that styrene have wax to prevent gumming.

If you put that type of styrene you ll fuck up the lamination (hand lay up or whatever)

15

Reverb for moderator!!   yew!!

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Gene Cooper mentioned something about squegeeing a coat ot lam resin on a blank and letting it kick. After that you glass as usual. It makes very good sense to me so I am gonna try it. I am using suncure so I can apply the resin and run the blank outside. I figure it should work great. Always looking for new stuff.

17

I wouldn’t get that.  It would just add weight, wouldn’t it?  A layer of resin with no fibers in it.  Maybe for appearance, no micro-bubbles on the foam.  But if the expert says to, I’ve been wrong before.

18

Hi reverb!

Sorry my english do not help sometimes. Thank you for the hints… of course Styrene Solution(WAX - SA) is different from Monomer Styrene, I got that! If use Sa on the fabric it becomes really heavy … impossible…

One question I´d like to make, do you use water when sanding with sand paper on the machine?

After the gloss coat I usally use:

sand paper 100, 220, 320, 400, 600, 1200  than polish… I use water only from 400 to 1200, not for 100, 220, 320…Sometimes I can see the machine marks on the board…

 

Regards,

 

 

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If you wet sand, you need to use a credit card to squeegee off a clean spot to see if you are getting rid of the swirl marks.  Also, for wet sanding, I put the board on edge, and keep it wet with a spray bottle.  On edge, the dirty water drips off, and the board keeps cleaner.  The trade off it do you want a white puddle on the floor and spray on the walls but cleaner air, or a dry floor and walls but air you cant breath and dust in your eyes.

Most post that they like dry, but wet is better for me.

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I use a super soft pad with 500 grit (dry). Low RPMS. Next is Sureluster compound with a wool pad. Last is a new wool pad with mequirs finishing glaze. Thats it.