I started using those full sheets of real thin hardwood veneer like you can get from Joewoodworking.com.
The come in sheets up to 11" wide and 110" long usually rolled up in a big roll…
Anyway on my 10’ restoration I’m applying two of these (Madrone) mated to a center strip of a different type (Anigre) over the sanded down glass of my 15 year old beater.
The wood is a little hard to work with as it’s so thin so it cracks alot during handling which kind of made me cring thinking of doing the top lam rail wraps…
Anyway after trimming my top lam to warp over the rail like a glass job, I decided to try an experiment and sprayed the rail edges of the lam with some veneer softener spray I had. And voila!
The wood just collapsed under it’s own weight and wrapped around the rail on it’s own accord… I thought I just witnessed a miracle and quickly applied some industrial saran wrap around the whole board to hold the wood bend in place while I let the softener dry out from the wood…
It kind of blew me away since I tried it earlier on the balsa strips with no effect at all. Maybe this paper thin wood veneer made the difference but this definitely will make the deck wrap over the rail much easier with this stuff. The spray seems a little oily but I hear it’s more like soap water that helps breaks down the cellulose structure in the veneer to allow the bending…
The full deck sheets are alot simpler that gluing up a stack of 4" wide 1/16 strips of balsa and the wood is ultra thin so a 6oz+wood+6oz or 4oz+wood+4oz sandwich should not weigh much more than the glass when its done… Sanding and patching could be a challenge unless you can some how do the top and bottom layer of glass at the same time in the bag with the wood.
I’m just going to put 2oz (vac’d using perfed release and absorbing batting) over the wood to seal it since the board is already glassed with double and triple 6oz. Its getting heavy already just with the epoxy and the paper thin wood…
Anyway just thought I’d pass this on in case some one’s interested…
Thanks, Oneula I could have used that 2 weeks ago! I’ve wondered about the veneer softener stuff, but held off not knowing if it would leave a residue that would affect bonding with the epoxy. I never thought of using the softener first to form the veneer & letting it dry that way…then lift it off & bond with glass & resin in a second step. Brilliant! Thanks.
Yeah I asked Joewoodworker.com that question a long time ago and he said it wouldn’t hurt even still wet which is why I bought a quart of it…
I was real dissapointed to see it’s non-affect on the 1/16 balsa but maybe it was just too thick.
Blown away by the result on the 1/64 real veneer.
That stuff is so thin it cracks with any pressure applied… almost impossible to flip a 10’x24" wide lam all by your self. The softener was a god send. pre-bent edges prior to the release filn wrap is a big advantage in pulling things tight. Decks are always the hardest lam to do but you know that already…
Doing a full lam with 2 maybe 3 sheets is also a different animal time saving… Imagine doing 1-2 long Super-T glue ups versus 10-20 short ones.
One thing though is there is alot of resin bleed through the 1/64 wood from the resin underneath so it kind of looks splotchy now. I’m hoping the exterior glassing will saturate and even out the color in the wood which started off kind of pinkish.
Have you run a test on how well epoxy/glass sticks to the veneer after being treated with the softener? I know the wood look is of high importance to you, I’m not sure if you’ll really get the sandwich strength using only 1/64 though. Again, a test would be in order.
I’m putting all this on the top of an already finished 10’ board double 6 bottom triple 6 top.
It’s primary purpose is to hide all the ugly ding patches and yellowed foam it’s accumulated over the past 15 years of abuse.
I’ve opted to do this instead of trying to strip off the glass and reglass a board that’s lost like 1/4" of it’s all foam during the glass rip…
The goal is to keep the weight down but strengthen the veneer.
So Step One:
rip off the fins and sand the beast down till the glass was showing
Step Two:
Vacuum lam the 1/64" Madrone and Anigre to top and bottom the exposed glass layer.
Step Three:
Glass the veneer with 2oz under vacuum with perforated release film and cotton batting to soak off as much excess resin from the glass as possible.
Step Four:
Put in the fin boxes
Step Five:
Layout a thin sealer/gloss coat that been thinned out or use the RR stuff with additive F to seal the 2oz
Step Six:
Lightly sand and buff out the sealer coat
I could actually skip five and six and just spray the lam coat with sealer spray to keep the weight down as well…
I’m finishing up Step Two:
If this was beeing done directly on a foam board I would’ve lammed the 1/64" veneer on with 2oz underneath for PU and 4-6oz for PE(probably seal the PE with spackle beforehand after adding on the wood rails). At that point it would be 4oz on the top of the wood for PU foam and 6-10oz for PE foam. 16oz (6+10) of glass/wood sandwich on 1lb EPS seems pretty strong to me as does a 10oz (4+6) glass/wood sandwich for the bottom.
of course I could always do glass+1/16 balsa+1/64 veneer+glass to make it stronger but that would be a waste of the balsa and Shwuz seems to have proven the 1/64 veneer sandwich on his projects already…
Yeah I can't believe they sell 1/64 veneer now. Don't look at it funny or it will come apart. Especially if it has figure. A mixture of 3-1 water and glycerin available at drugstore is basically what you have in veneer softening products.
the bamboo weave tikibar wall covering is way too thick
and the veneer is fuzz backed
I tried it once on 1/16 maple to help it bend around the nose and tail rails
seems like this stuff has alot of glycerin in it to break down the surface tension
my brother and i several months ago laid down a bunch of makore, birds eye maple, birch, koa, white oak, tineo, and tigerwood skins on 4oz and 2oz cloth using Greg's tflex method. We haven't tried rolling up these 24" wide half glassed veneers up for storage yet but this way when we're ready we can just pull out a sheet or roll of what ever we fancy and skin a shapd board in a bag with some scissors and a screen roller. With Greg's new technique you don;t have to preform the rail wraps like we did. The rail wraps look cooler though like they are made out of solid wood.
I have a big box of cypress, koa and tulipwood(my new favorite wood) veneers to half glass and store for future use as well.
Also a 4 year old big box of 1/16" Canadian Maple planks for making skateboard blanks from Roar-rocket that can be used for spingers and perimeter rails instead of balsa or bass wood.
Bernie, that is such a great idea. Build the T-flex and use your method to wrap the rails with wood veneer. I just can’t let the board go with white foam rails.
I could have used that 2 weeks ago! I’ve wondered about the veneer softener stuff, but held off not knowing if it would leave a residue that would affect bonding with the epoxy. I never thought of using the softener first to form the veneer & letting it dry that way…then lift it off & bond with glass & resin in a second step. Brilliant! Thanks.