Though id run a question by you all before i commit to it. Hopefully i can use the communities wealth of knowledge for any recommendations.
So i originally my plan was to just laminate the board im currently shaping with a simple blue tint, with the different shades occurring due to cut lapping technique.
Once the resin cured the tint was a much lighter, and almost grey in appearance, compared to the electric blue when it first was applied. Basically i dont like the way in turned out, plus there is a few messy patches from where the couch it was leaning on between work disintegrated into it the laminate…
So what i wanted to ask the sawylocks community was whether you think a resin swirl could be pulled off during the filler coat. I know it may appear a bit finny due to the fact i will use a brush to spread it out evenly.
Has anyone done this?/ have a better idea how it would turn out? or how best to achieve it?
I was thinking to maybe even atomize some tint sparsely over the board after ive poured it on to make a speckled pattern.
I understand the repeated brushing may lead to too much mixing, but maybe if i get most of it filled already with a clear batch, and then use a little more with the tint over the top which i can possibly not fiddle with as much.
Yup. Way too late for a swirl.
Also, trying to apply really thin layers of resin or “atomising” it won’t work. Sanding resin needs to have enough mass to cure properly. Laying it on too thin or brushing it a lot will leave it permanently sticky and near impossible to sand.
In other words, it will look like shit. When you sand it you’ll get splotchy color patches. There are a few boards out there where laminators did this as the intended effect, but it still looks like shit. Looks like shit can be a fun look though if your just building stuff n your own garage and goofing off and don’t care what other people think. Mike
Try to Understand the medium and how resin flows. I’m far from good and can get some ok results. As stated by many - a classic swirl on a lam isn’t gonna happen. Maybe with some serious skill and luck.
I’m not a big fan of resin in the lam coat but I can be done. And you can do some cool stuff.
All these boards have color at some stage post lam. Some have color in the lam as well.
Marble on the rails on the last board were done pre lam and given detail post lam- pre hotcoat.
No expert here either, but I have done color in a lam coat over existing fiberglass. Obviously over foam is better, and you have to be really careful sanding, but color in the fiberglass is viable (do-able) in my book, whereas color in the fill coat is not, IMO.
I’ve used the same batch of tinted resin for the lam and hotcoat. Comes out smooth, the tinted hotcoat evens everything out and makes the color deeper. If you’re mixing the hotcoat make it on to the lighter side if anything because darker would be blotchy after sanding.
Hello Mr Gene - It wasn’t mentioned in your post but so I have to ask… do you mix surfacing agent in the mix for the hot coat stage? I.E. pigmented lam resin for the lamination layer then add styrene/wax to the mix? Catalyst adjustments at any point?
Qpaque covers a multitude of sins. Blue tint or pigment with White added until a test spot will not allow you to read the print on newspaper. The color will be a pastel, but will be even and cover everything. Lam it with four ounce. I did a board a couple of years ago and did a Coke Bottle tint on the bottom and an Opaque deep Green deck with cutlap. Used the same pigment to get both colors. Added White to the Green to get the deep Green.
Maybe I should have worded it differently. You can use tint in a fill coat over a lam, and I have done it. But by the tenor of your questions, and lacking any photos, I wouldn’t recommend it to you for this situation. Because the effectiveness of the tint is very very limited, as opposed to tint over foam. Tint is transparent, and in something as thin as a fill coat, over a surface that will not absorb any resin, I don’t think it will solve your issue. Just trying to give my best guess to a question that begs explanatory photos but includes none, reading between the lines to guess your experience level and expected result.
