RR Epoxy with Fast Hardener

General Discussion
1

So I just put in my latest order from RR. A 3 gallon kit with fast hardener plus addy ‘F’ and some X-55 accelerator.

I have gotten my lams down significantly better. I timed my last bottom lam at around 20 minutes with a little fiddling, and it came out very well. The top one wasn’t so good, but that was because the recommended amount 15oz. did not wet out the 2 layers of 6oz cloth enough, ended up with lots of dry area on my laps.

So I am going to go with fast hardener now, what with fall coming along shortly and most especially so that the 6 hour wait for hot and gloss coats will be a thing of the past.

My question is concerning the warnings about heat generated while in the pot. The idea of course is to get the stuff mixed and out onto the board ASAP and then work it around.

What about if I was doing a resin swirl? The last time I did one, I mixed 3 different colors and a batch of clear as base, split the clear up into 5 cups and then added some of each color to each cup, swirled slightly and then proceeded to pour out onto the board.

Would that be too many steps with the resin sitting around, even in smaller amounts? (cups had 3-4 oz each)

Would it be safer to just mix the base in a large bucket and then add the colors, swirl, then pour it strategically on the board?

Just wondering how fast this stuff will generate heat. The guy at RR told me to watch out for heat, not to use FCS plugs even. I use Futures, so no prob there; what about a single fin box? … just add cabosil to the mix to dissipate heat?

Anyway, it will be nice to not have such a long wait time to flip. The rest will just be challenging. :wink:

thanks for any help.

Edit: I won’t be using the accelerator in the lam resin mixes, just the hot and gloss coats. I wouldn’t want to see if I could lam THAT fast, not yet…

2

What is the room temp during glassing? If you keep it lower, you can do swirl work no problem. Super early mornings are good, since things will warm up by midday. Definitely want to minimize the time “in the bucket”. We have a refrigerator right at the lam room so we will place waiting buckets in there to retard the reaction.

Here’s a trick we learned recently for installing boxes. Wait for the epoxy to start to go into “B stage” and then install. During install be sure to manually coat the inside of the hole in the board and manually coat the box. “B stage” is the first signs of the resin getting thicker and entering into a change of state from liquid to solid. Also, be sure the hole you make in the box is tight, too much volume and you could overheat, which would be a nightmare.

3

Thanks for the tips Plusone.

I guess if the amount is low, like around an ounce or so, for the box installs, then you can just leave it sit, until it hits the ‘b’ stage? That is a good tip to have as having a ‘melt down’ with a finbox would not be a good thing. Is that tip for futures? Or for FCS or other boxes?

Now that fall is coming it will be pretty easy to keep the room somewhere in the 70’s fahrenheit. I guess with that and some care it shouldn’t be a problem with swirls. … maybe I should find one of those small bar fridges. Could be put to extra uses too. :wink:

4

you can use RR on resin swirls at least into the mid to upper 80’s. I did an 11’6" SUP with 4 colors, but I didn’t put the hardner in until I was ready for that color. If I can do it, you can do. Plan your work, work the plan. Use a different stir stick for the color and the mixing of the resin and hardner.

5

Yes, meltdowns are a nightmare. When you pot boxes and such into EPS, you are pouring into an fully insulated hole,

and epoxy NEEDS to get rid of its heat. If the heat can’t go anywhere, then the epoxy goes nuclear and can melt your beautiful core, liquifying the blank up to several inches around the plug internally.

Futures are one of the easier systems with epoxy. If you are doing color work (swirls, tints) I would recommend potting the boxes after laminating but before hotcoating the bottom. This gives a tighter look avoiding the surface texture from the install resin that changes the look of the resin in your color work.

With opaques, you can put the boxes in during lamination and the look is very clean with just the fin slot showing when finished. Be sure to use clear epoxy if installing after laminating and put at least two layers of cloth over the boxes to trap them properly.

FCS has been the most challenging. We finally figured it out. We double-batch them. Plus we still wait until B-stage to pour.

Double-batching is pouring the first batch just half way into the hole. Just up to the little foam column with the ring cut around it. Be sure the plugs are installed at this time, so they just contact the pour. This conducts the heat out. DO NOT OVERFILL, as it is very tempting- be precise: pour, install plugs, align jigs, wait.

Also, cut your FCS hole super clean, no tears in the EPS, this can cause hot spots. To do clean cuts, spin your tools very fast and go very slow. You can put a heat sink on the deck side during this first batch, we tape a wet paper towel to the deck side. This is true only for the side fins, as the stringer acts as a heat conductor for the center fin.

Proceed with the second batch only after you notice the temp has dropped from the first batch.

Hope this helps.

6

Plusone,

Thanks for the heads up, that is a lot of useful info. I have been using Lokbox since I have been doing compsands. The routed hole is in a pvc foam insert which isolates the eps from some of the heat, but it still seems to take a lot of resin to fill the void! have you used lokbox? and if so do you use neat resin as the recommend or do you add cabo-sil? I have not had any smokers yet, but as I use 3/4lb eps for the core do have some concerns with that amount of resin in the board. RR seems to exotherm less than the other epoxies that I have used though.

7
Quote:

The guy at RR told me to watch out for heat, not to use FCS plugs even

I just install some fcs plugs with the fast hardener and there was no drama. I didn’t feel any heat through the deck so I assumed all is good.