Phantom 18 in Maine

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sgorey
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Phantom 18 in Maine

Post by sgorey »

Well, I can't believe I've made it this far seeing that I went against the advice of many by not building a small boat before building a larger one. :)

I know I still have a very long way to go, but fiberglassing the outside of the hull was a bid deal for me.

I spent 6hrs taping the seams Friday night, 4hrs glassing one side and 3hrs glassing the other on Saturday.

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A little too much epoxy :oops:

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So far things that I've learned:

* allocate enough time to complete the task. I started glassing one side Saturday morning knowing that I wouldn't have too much time to finish. I ended up running out of time so I stopped applying epoxy to the fiberglass before it was completely covered. I then came back to a mess.

* mix conservative size batches. Saturday morning I went for a big finish and mixed too much and paid for it. The epoxy started to kick and I didn't realize the mistake I was making by applying it until it was too late. :(

:help: how do I fix it?
Image

* scale for mixing ratios. I bought one today because I am sick of pouring resin into one container, the hardener into another then both into a third container. I have the pumps but who wants to pump 18 times to get 6oz. Hopefully the scale will allow me to mix in one container.

* Be smart (if you can) about the products you buy. Even though I purchased the fiberglass kit from bateau, I didn' approximate the amount of each hardener I needed very well. I asked for 2 fast hardeners and 2 medium hardeners. My garage has been in the upper 40's to low 50's for the last week. I should have been using a mix of the two hardeners but instead I used only the fast. Now I am running low on the fast hardener and a long winter a head of me with mostly the medium hardener. I'll probably end up buying the 3 gallon kit along with more filler material. I'm going to need it to get a boat that looks half as good as the ones in the gallery.

* metric rules.

Thanks Jacques and the rest of you guys for supporting such a great web site.


Off to sanding....
Steve

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JimW
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Post by JimW »

You have to cut out those areas where the glass didn't wet out. I have good luck using a sharp wood chisel to cut the glass right where the air pocket edge starts. After cutting out all the bad areas sand the edges so the new layer will lay flat and start again. I used 4 to 6 oz batches and had it set up so I could pour the batch out and squeegie it until it was gone then run over and pump 4 resin, pump 2 hardener, stir for 60 seconds and pour the next batch. But you are right you have to have a good amount of time to do a large hull surface. If I could ever trust a helper to count pumps it would be nice to "order" another batch as I squeegie the last of a batch. Do not let emotions change your plan, like frustration driving you to mix a big batch. You know what to do, do not talk yourself into shortcuts. This is where trouble starts. Just keep plugging with the proven techniques you do very well. Do not try to reinvent the wheel. Chin up, we all learned these same lessons. Mine was with chine and transom joint lamination bubbles.

The medium hardener is good for fillets even when it's cold out, because of the thickness and mass of the curing fillet, the heat builds up faster. You will be able to use much of that medium hardener on interior corners. Even the tape lamination can be medium if you work wet on wet over "hot curing" fillets.
Jim Wright
CC, D15, SC16, C19

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tech_support
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Post by tech_support »

Do not use a scale if your ratio is given in volume!!!!! Its not the same.

A 2:1 in volume is not the same in weight.

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fishingdan
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Post by fishingdan »

sgorey,

Don't worry about not having fast hardener for working in the cold. I worked through most of last winter with medium hardener. There will be some weeks when it will take 4 or 5 days for the epoxy to fully cure, but you can work around that with planning if desired. In my case, it didn't matter since I only worked on my boat a couple of times per week. The important thing is to keep the epoxy at or near normal room temps.

As Jim stated, the mistakes you have made have been made by all builders.

good luck,
Dan

sgorey
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Post by sgorey »

JimW wrote:You have to cut out those areas where the glass didn't wet out.
I was afraid of that. But better now than after it has been faired and painted.
JimW wrote:... Mine was with chine and transom joint lamination bubbles.
So all lamination bubbles need to be repaired???

A couple of the images show white spots on the chine and bow. How to repair?
1) chisel out and patch with glass and epoxy or
2) drill hole and fill with epoxy

Thanks for your responses.

Steve

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JimW
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Post by JimW »

sgorey wrote: So all lamination bubbles need to be repaired???

A couple of the images show white spots on the chine and bow. How to repair?
1) chisel out and patch with glass and epoxy or
2) drill hole and fill with epoxy

Thanks for your responses.

Steve
Any that have any size to them need fixing. A taped seam with bubbl;es underneath is only as strong as the wood alone and the thin layer of glass alone. Either can be borken pretty easily. Two times easily is still in the "Easily" order of magnatude. Bonded well to form a two skin matrix the strength skyrockets. Air bubbles over more than about 10% of an area really weaken that area.

Filling with resin is good if possible. I gouged out the glass, added thickened epoxy putty and glass taped over the top. Hang in there.
Jim Wright
CC, D15, SC16, C19

sgorey
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Post by sgorey »

JimW wrote:...Hang in there.
Thanks for the encouragement and advice. I used a block plane to scrape off what I could, then used a disk sander and got the rest. It was definitely needed. Once the top layer of epoxy was scraped off, I saw all of the "dry" fiberglass.

Steve

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Post by jasonmcintosh »

Jim's giving good advise. Mistakes like those is where the smaller boat would have helped you, but it looks like you're doing a great job.

Make sure your hull is as absolutely flat as possible.

jason
Hopefully fishing from my GF18

sgorey
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Post by sgorey »

jasonmcintosh wrote: Make sure your hull is as absolutely flat as possible.
I spent a good deal of time with string, a square, a staight 2x4 and a tape measure to get it as flat and square as possible before taping and fiberglassing. But now that the outside is fiberglassed, it's not too flat anymore. Two layers of tape on the trasom, plus one for the hull seam, plus two layers of glass (where they overlap) gets pretty thick. Microballoons/Silica to the rescue.

I layed fiberglass over the bad spot tonight. It went pretty well, and the new scale revealed that my resin and hardener pumps aren't acurate (bought locally, not from bateau). 2:1 pumps did not equal 100g:43g (per the Epoxy book). It explains why I have more hardener then I should in comparison to the amount of resin I've used.

Steve

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Post by tech_support »

I think we have this straight, but I want to make certain - The 2:1 mix ratio is for volume, NOT weight.

Pumps are not as accurate as most graduated cups, but they are more convenient for smaller batches. Try using both together. For example for a 6 oz. batch; pump 4 oz of resin then look to see if your at 4 oz. on the cup, then 2 oz. hardener - then make sure your at 6.

The epoxies we sell are designed to be forgiving to the amateur, so unless there is a large mistake, you should be OK.

Joel

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