Everything here is very good advise for sure. To answer your hand sanding question...experiment with a little bit of everything...hard, soft, medium...My favorite thing to hand sand rails is simply off the shelf full sand paper sheets folded in quarters...then I use a piece of that non-skid stuff you can buy to line cupboards with...to go between my hand and the paper. Helps me to grip it and helps with how hot the paper can get when you really go at it. In the flats..larger is better...a scrap 2 X 4 say 12" long with a little of the same non-skid stuff as padding. Definitely a lot of work. Good for your paddling muscles!
I have also used sanding sponges similar to those used by drywallers. I like the thin foam backed ones. 3M and Norton make them and they come in medium and fine. They wrap around the rail nicely and can be used with water.
Yah MCDING, I found those 3M sponges after the first hotcoat mishap and I had four of them in all grits but I lost the fine grits and I used the coarse grits on the rails and some of those scratched areas like in the pics. Those coarser grits were like 60-80 grit though. Those things do work great and looking back I will do my rail work with those instead of hitting it hard with the power tools.
Right on. The maroon ones are coarser, like 60 or 80. The red and green are finer. You pay a little more for the red and green than the maroon, but they last thru multipe sandings. Seriously if you get a good hotcoat down , sand the flats with the sander, hit the rails with those foam sanding pads and the go over the whole thing by hand with a worn out piece of 400 or 600, you'll be good to go.
Hey MCDING One thing I have been thinking about after reading about your “piss coat” mix, could my hotcoat resin be to thick and maybe I am not getting it to cover like I want because my shop is so cold (like 50-60 degrees)? I was thinking of thinning it a little with some acetone or heating it a bit to make it run a little better. Just a thought that crossed my mind.
I am in the process of starting two new boards. I had a broken board that I stripped for the foam and I spackled it up and I am going to practice glassing on it. I have a blank all ready and I should be starting on that soon. I also got a new planer today so that should be a whole nother issue.
The "piss coat" is just a remedy for over sanding. I think the key to your problem is getting down a good hotcoat to begin with. Your room is too cool. You need to bring it up to seventy degrees if possible. And make sure the temp holds and doesn't fall or cool down while you are brushing on your hotcoat. Make sure you get enough catalyst in whatever amount of resin you are using. Use a fairly good brush. Spread it like a road grader up and down the board. Do diagonal cross strokes the full length of the board and then come back and lay it off length wise . The diaganol cross strokes are where you will be pulling excess resin off the board. If you pull and lay off right, in a room that holds seventy degrees it will flow out and be nice and even. A lite touch on the final lay off and work fast. Blow your brush out with an air compressor to rid it of any dust particles etc.
When in doubt a simple solution for the how -to problem is all the great board build videos on youtube…as is told over and over, one picture is worth a thousand words!!!
I love those grey 3m pad made in England… They last for a long long time, clean up easy, great for the rails/curved areas… I only wish I could find the extra fine again. Good enough for a final finish…
True story.
My first board attempt was glassed with chop strand and general purpose resin, the old man at the hardware store told me what to use. The board was so shit it was funny, I spent ages sanding it with dads super aggressive belt sander and re glassing the bits of exposed foam .I eventually gave up trying to make it perfect and decided to go surf it and it went no were as good as it looked. I then sold it in the trading post to a beginner who had never even bean to a surf beach. This all happened back before the conception of the internet.