Wetting the laps...

I have a question regarding wetting laps during the lam process. Say I’m doing the first step (laminating the bottom of the board with a single layer of 6oz. cloth with cutlaps). After pouring the resin on the cloth and working it tail to nose and then rail to rail, do you pour more resin along the rails and squeegee it out over the rails so that gravity takes the resin down into the laps…? I tried to do that, and it seemed to work ok, except that the lap doesn’t get entirely wet, it’s more like the resin “drips” every 3 inches or so and is really good in those areas, but then there are massive dry spots that I end up trying to wet once I’ve wrapped the laps underneath onto the deck. And my other question (related to the previous one) is : After laminating the bottom of the board and getting your laps all wet, do you wait 10 minutes or so until the lam coat is “semi-kicking” and THEN wrap your laps underneath so that the cloth doesn’t “fall off” the the upside down deck? If not, what do you do, because it seems that if you wrap them under too early, gravity will simply “pull” the laps back off the board underneath…Hope that makes sense. Thanks.

Hey

First of all, you wet from the center out. Keeps cloth centered on blank.

After wetting out the bottom, you flip the rails up, pour along the now INSIDE of the glass, flip it back down (all with a squeegee), and it’s fully saturated, ready to be layed up and it will stick.

If you have time, sqeegee over the entire lam, including squeegeeing up the rails, making sure to get full saturation.

YOU NEVER SIT AROUND AND WAIT, while resin is kicking off. YOU work the whole time, checking and double checking, until you know you glass jobs come out fine.

Thanks Lee…

I’ve read about the method of “flipping” the rail’s up onto the already saturated bottom, but it seems like it would want to stick to itself and be hard to flip them back down, but it sounds like it might be the best way for me.

It took me 4 or 5 boards of being stingy before I learned a little gem… waste some resin. I was trying to use the minimum, once I increased that 25% my glasses were a lot better.

First step – is that when your saturating the deck/bottom, is to make sure no resin spills on the laps – this would create a wetted path that the resin will follow – BAD. So keep it centered. I leave about 2-3”, but leave more the first time. Remember if your deck is crowned that it will want to run off more, the bottom isn’t such a problem. Oh yea, always toss a level on it before you glass, make sure its even, nose to tail, rail to rail.

When its time to hit the laps, I pour a big puddle in a spot a couple inches off the rail then a smaller trail moving forward (any direction, just pick one) to maybe a foot or two in front of the puddle. Use your squeegee to pull that big puddle towards the rail and forward and you’ll get a nice thick waterfall coming over the laps and progressing forward. Stop once that waterfall isn’t robust enough of saturate the entire lap – i.e. it will start to follow the wet spots and leave dry areas. The key is to let the momentum of that big puddle of resin overcome the surface tension forces from the wet/dry interface. What your left with is 2 feet of completely saturated laps without any dry spots in between. Then repeat where you left off. I think you’ll find with a little practice that it’s kinda easy. Oh yea… keep your bucket under that lap, a little behind, to catch the falling resin. There’s a bit of a lag, so you’re squeegee will actually be ahead of the bucket.

As far as kicking. I saturate the deck, wet the laps, hit the deck again – this time forcing the resin into the fabric getting all dry spots. By this time my laps are usually ready to wrap – but that’s a function of how hot you kick it. Laps should be one of the last things you do, so if you’re moving “in time” with the kick of your resin, they should be ready when you are. It’s all a rhythm and it just takes practice. I’ve been converted, once I started figuring out the rhythm I started enjoying glassing almost as much as shaping.

Hope this helps – kinda hard to explain.

Yea… I forgot that a lot flip the laps up… I prefer the wasteful method.

I never use the flip up/flip down method, although I’ve seen it done. Seems like an unnecessary step to me, but each to his own…

Tenover, if you want to, come by this weekend or next and I’ll show you how to do it. It’s just way easier to watch it than to try to describe it.

Keith-

I can’t tell you how stoked I’d be to watch you do a lam, hotcoat, whatever…I can learn things 10x easier by watching. Let me know the time and day and I’ll be there for sure. Thanks for the offer.

From a strangers perspective.

Keith,

I must comment on your unselfish act of offering to share with someone some of the intricacies of boardmaking. Your giving will come back to you tenfold, even Tenover.

Tenover,

You will learn a lot by watching and exchanging with Kieth, and I hope you improve and pass along the stoke as well.

I learned most of my stuff by myself. The guys who didn’t want me to learn didn’t stop me. The guys who helped me and learned from me are in my memory forever.

Life’s too short to be selfish. Good on ya guys. Onya Swaylocks.

hey tenover do you have an AIM name? if not go to aim.com and sign up and tell me your name. ill put you on my buddy list and send you a video of me glassing through it. its not a marble swirl or anything but it shows how to wet it out really well. Austin S.

Howzit tenover, I don't think flipping the rails is such a good idea since it's just another step that could turn into a problem. I personnally like to wet out the rails first by running a bead of resin just above the rail from nose to tail , than flow it over the rail. Then do the flat bottom area,next rewet the rail and wrap. This prevents any dry areas in the rails and gives you a little extra resin to spread past the glas on to the foam. With the resin protecting the foam you can take down the lap without marring the foam or that beautiful paint job. Aloha, Kokua

Thanks for the tips guys…Wildy- Of COURSE I’d pass whatever I learn on to whoever asks me in the future, that’s half the fun…That is of course if I can apply what I learn to the actual building process!! Austin- That would be awesome if you could send that video. I just joined up with a name, so send it over when you get a chance…My AIM name is:

tenover2004

Thanks.

Hey Austin, I don’t know if this system is capable of it or not, but a video like that posted to Swaylocks would help a lot of 1st timers. Mr. P?? feasible?

If it’s not feasible, I don’t mind hosting it on my own site and posting a link to it on here (as long as Austin is ok with it)…It would be a huge help to alot of people I think.

new here, but i’ve been building my own boards since the 70’s. i use a regular rubber squeegee on the deck/bottom and use the usual techniques to saturate the deck/bottom. then i turn the laps using a 3" chip brush, and saturate any dry spots at the same time using resin left in the bucket. occasionally leaves some strings when doing a freelap, but the sanding coat will work them out. doesn’t hurt to be a bit generous with the resin, either.

Howzit Kokua - I always like hearing about your techniques… when you say you wet out the rails first with a “bead” of resin, how much are you talking about? Is it enough to wet out the laps or just a start in that direction?

thx,

Keith

Welcome aboard, Peter! Yup, it’s those strings that bug me (so I don’t flip the laps and I seem to get a few less of them)…What neck of the world are you in?

Quote:

If it’s not feasible, I don’t mind hosting it on my own site and posting a link to it on here (as long as Austin is ok with it)…It would be a huge help to alot of people I think.

That would be awesome.

I started with the bead technique, but the resin always seemed to stream and leave dry spots… it wasn’t until I put a puddle at the start of the (thick) bead that my laps started going smoothly. Not to say that the bead doesn’t work, I’m confident Kokua does just fine with his - I’m just saying, from a rookie perspective, it helped me a lot to be generous with the resin.

If it can be posted i would be glad to show it. its nothing special and not the best quality but it might help somebody if you watch closely. Austin S.

Well i tried to post it here but it exceeded the maximum kb’s for posting. Austin S.