I am just starting shaping my eps foam. I want to start looking for resin to use. I am based in Egypt so surfing specific brands are unavailable to me. What other brands can i use for epoxy resin? Is there a specific type of epoxy i should be looking for? I am a complete beginner and i’ve never glassed anything before so any advice is welcome.
From reading through the forum, i’ve heard of West Systems and i think they have a distributor here in egypt. Any others? Can I just use any local store epoxy resin?
You can essentially use any epoxy laminating resin. The biggest difference between boat building and surfboard epoxy is the colour and UV stability. West Systems epoxy is a good resin but has a yellow/honey colour which will darken quickly in the sun. It will need to be painted to protect it.
Update: I can’t find any specific laminating epoxy resins in egypt, only coating/casting resins. I am lost here as there are tons of options but it seems the most common use with fibreglass cloth is polyester resin, and I have EPS foam at hand. Do any specific industries use laminating epoxy so i could look into that? Would coating epoxy work? or decorative epoxy used for art and stuff. Any help would be appreciated as importing resin research or other epoxies would be way too expensive and would take ages to arrive.
the composite industry. the boat yard is also a good place to search for that.
make sure the resin as uv protection or if there is any uv aditive available to mix in the resin to protect yellowing.
cheers and good wavws
Comparing data sheets is a good place to start. Have you found any data sheets for the more common ones like Resin Research?
The only detail I see missing on that datasheet is the ‘flip’ time or how soon it can be handled after coating. The 48 hour recoat (assuming without sanding) is nice.
this is surfpro resin research. It seems to have a bit higher strength in most properties if u convert the units for comparison. However idk how much difference that would make in the boards durability. Could i use 6 oz cloth to account for that decrease in strength? For reference:
Tensile Strength: 72 vs 60 MPa
Flexural Strength: 102 vs 95 MPa
Tensile Modulus(E-modulus): 2723 vs 3000 MPa
and the flip time i assume is the “Initial curing time” which is stated to be 15hrs for the one i sent. Compared to what i assume is “THIN FILM SET” in the RR datasheet, which is 1.5hrs
“Deco pox 39 is formulate to produce clear laminate…” exactly what you need. You can go with it no problems. I bet is more or less same products we all use: modern 2:1 uv stable, no voc, fast cure epoxy.
My experience is that the ‘surfboard’ types of 2:1 clear have shorter working and quicker initial cure times along with costing more. I have bought a couple of batches of 2:1 clear general purpose without optical brighteners. The cost is less but the initial cure time is much longer, perhaps 10-12 hours before handling and another 12-24 hours before I’d want to sand it.
At resin research you have 3 products for surfboard build. Standard RR2000 with fast mid and low hardener, kwick kick fast and high viscosity, surf pro wich is between both.
If you sand too soon, the resin smears and gums up the sand paper. It is also said that handling the cured resin too soon exposes the user to more of the chemicals that promote allergies or dermatitis.
I would make a sample piece to laminate and learn the resin’s behavior with regards to cure time, sanding, etc. before committing it to a board.
Yes wear gloves when you sand epoxy is a good habit.
To help for finish coat you can add a little (1%) of wax styren as sanding additif to epoxy resin.
