It’s been a while since I’ve read or posted here. It’s been a while since I’ve done any board building. How’s it going?
Last June I had a flight booked for a trip to the Maldives. Prior to then, I had shaped a board just for the trip. It ended up getting canceled due to the whole pandemic thing. After the cancellation I found it difficult to get motivated to finish glassing the board. Honestly, it was difficult to get motivated to do anything.
Fast forward to today. We are getting ready to moved back to SD, which I am really exited about. I didn’t want my fully shaped EPS blank to get dented up in the move, so I decided to put some glass on it. I didn’t take any pictures during the shaping process, but, did a couple of time lapse videos that can share of the glassing job.
I used the last of my Resin Research Kwick Kick epoxy. It had been sitting in a cabinet untouched for over a year. A big clump of solids had settled at the bottom of the resin bottle, so I stuck it in the microwave to warm it up. After a few 30 second bursts the clumps started to dissolve. They didn’t go away entirely, though, and I didn’t want the liquid to get too hot. I just shook up the bottle for a while until everything was uniform. I hope it will still work ok.
Here’s a link to an album with the time lapse videos.
Swied . Good to see you post. Board looks good. Go dig the “Cliffs” . Welcome back. Lowel PS. Didn’t even notice that my IPad wanted to rename you “Swiped”. Haha. My bad. I like that swirl. The combination of colors is one I would like to try. Any thoughts behind it or just random?
I am very familiar with the “Cliffs” as I am an alumnus of PLHS. I definitely plan on getting some newb’s tubes. Hahaha
To tell you the truth, the colors did not really turn out as planned. I didn’t expect that it would turn out predominantly green. I was originally thinking it would be mostly yellow.
When doing an epoxy swirl I like to start with a large batch (580 grams) of a single color. In this case I chose yellow. I didn’t add too much pigment to the yellow because I wanted to be able to see the stringer. For the swirls I made two small 6 Dram cups, one with blue and another with white pigment. I used a lot of pigment in the small cups so the swirls would have a lot of contrast. Note: mix all of the colors into the resin before adding the hardener. Once the hardener goes in you only want to focus on the mixing to ensure that the epoxy cures properly.
Once I finished mixing the hardener into the resin I poured a little bit of the white and the blue into the yellow bucket. I also poured a few drops of white into the blue, and blue into the white. I didn’t stir any of the colors together to avoid muddying up the batch.
Whatever color hits the foam first is the color that will stick. I started by pouring out the smaller cups with the most intense colors. Finally, I dumped the entire bucket of the larg batch before touching the squeegee to the board. The more you squeegee, the more you muddy things up, so I try to be as efficient as possible with my squeegee work. I try to get the middle completely covered first and then work the resin out to the rails. Keep in mind that you don’t need to “work in” epoxy like you do with poly resin.
I think I might have worked the resin a bit too much, though, resulting in the blue and yellow creating the light green coloring. Oh well, I still like the final result.
You can’t see it in the pictures, but, I taped off the deck. When I laminate the deck later today I’m going to add a tiny bit of white to the resin mix. I usually do this to avoid yellowing as the board ages. The white will be so subtle that you won’t see it on the laps. It will just look clear.
