Attempting to “reglaze” an old tub in my place, and as I watched my crappy store-bought kit sputtering chunks on my tub, I thought, “there must be a better way”. Anyone use poly or epoxy to redo a tub? I was thinking of a poly gloss coat with white pigment. Ideas? Anyone tried it?
Come on, I know you’re all a bunch of tinkerers. Am I really the only one to think of this?
I didn’t redo the whole tub, but I recently put in a fiberglass patch where there was a crack. I used epoxy and many layers of 4oz cloth. Give me a week and I will report back as to how it has bonded. I used 60grit to rough up the surface gel coat. I am assuming its gel coat anyway
shapensurf , are you talking bathtub?..white colour-matched enamel …if it’s a more modern fibreglass constructed tub , the finish would likely be vynilester over a gellcoat , depending on where it was made…
At our last place, about 15 years ago I built a wooden bath copied from a Japanese design, a big square pine beast of a thing, varnished on the outside, resined on the inside. It looked amazing, ( well I thought so) at first the wife didnt like it but after a while she loved the way it looked. It aged with all the grace of an old sailing boat and slowly the rails bore the marks of a thousand uses. It was in the second bathroom so it wasnt a real centrepiece but when we sold up the new owners wanted to know where we bought it so they could get a new one for the main bathroom.
Abouit 7 years ago I saw a wooden bathtub in a Queensland designer showroom and they wanted $8000 for it.
feh !
Over the years working construction in Calif. and Hawaii I ran into a coupleuys of guys who did tub repair . Fiberglass only. Most tubs are Polyester. Glass mat and Gel-coat. Met one guy in Cal. that went all ovthe Central Coast fixing tub/showers that were cracked or chipped due to construction related accidents, such as 2x4's etc. being dropped in them. Very common. He started with Gel-coat in a Dixie cup and added pigment to get the shade of white or tan as necessary. Cast iron and porcelin are a differant animal though. He would wet&dry sand and polish just like you would fix a ding on a polished board.
I had a “Goth” apartment tenant who decided to dye her clothes black in the bathtub. That pemanently stained the white enamel in the cast iron tub. When she moved out, I hired a professional bathtub refinisher to fix it. He sealed of the whole bathroom and sprayed this really really nasty epoxy coating. The guy was using a fresh air mask attached to an airline in order to not breathe the toxic fumes. I was told not to go in the room for 24 hours. I couldn’t help to take a peek so a few hour later I went to take a look and was floored by the vapors in the room. No vapors in a glass shop could compare to this this stuff. The stuff did do the trick. The tub looked brand new. He charged $300 to do it which was way cheaper that replacing the tub that would have involved removing a wall to get it out.
You should’ve done a falsa bathtub !!!..with redwood stringers !!!..cool.