Sea Sled madness. It’s in my brain.

RX is your man for that... he'll have more in-depth info.

 

RxComposite, good idea AdHoc.
John, he is a member here.
Try PM'ing RxComposite, you can find them on the member list in the header above.

 

Good view of unfair planking made good, and abrasion to glass, when scratching epoxy for next lamination.

 

Things look good.

 

Agreed.

 

Thanks guys.

 

No, not exactly. We use peel ply all the time in aerospace. Epoxy is a good adhesive. You just have to prep the surface by acetone wipe to remove contamination. Sanding along the fiber grain if it is too rough for you. Slivers is what you want to tone down, not the fibers.

Sandblasting we reserve for aluminum inserts but in a jiffy, crosshatching by sandpaper will do. Followed by acetone cleaning.

If we want super shiny part on a female mold, we use a very light veil cloth and the epoxy is loaded with microbaloons.

 

Moving along.

 

Wow, this is serious!

 

Good to see some glass on it. Good you are taking it slow as well. I have watched a few builders mess up here and grind it all off.

Reference lines are smart and improve quality.

I only lost one big piece of glass in my build about 3'x3' when I realized I forgot to stir the epoxy. That is a remove and scrub with acetone emergency. Then I lost an upside down application piece as well.

 

I had a nightmare time putting on 2 hull side pieces. 25' long, 50" wide, perfectly vertical slab side. Nothing would hold them on, and the more I screwed with them, the more I pulled apart the biax. In the end, only lost a few inches of the end by the transom. Grind off and relay tomorrow. Worked 12 hours yesterday. 2 strips in the center of the tunnel. One strip on the starboard non-tripping chine. 2 pieces on the starboard side. One piece on the starboard tunnel. Wont get much farther tomorrow. Must wire brush half of that before more glassing. Really needed 2 more folks yesterday, but there was nobody to hire.

 

I read that part again about peel ply and micro abrasion.

If you are doing your 2nd layer layup while the 1st layer is still tacky or not fully cured, no need for sanding. If it was fully cured and layered by peel ply (secondary bond), slight sanding is needed if there are slivers left by the peel ply. Or if the part is shiny (too much resin, poor workmanship) you will have to abrade it but not enough to damage the fibers. Less is better. There is not much difference with peel plied surfaces+dewaxing and peel plied+sanded surfaces. Only small critical joints are sanded for 100% compliance.

As for the experiments done by university students with access to chemical etching, micro abrasions technique, sophisticated test equipment, all these surface preparations is hardly distinguishable from each other and can hardly be measured. The tried and true way is surface prep like paint. Sand to dull finish fully cured surfaces just to have a dull finish, just enough for the paint to grip. No sanding on wet on wet coat or "tacky dry".

 

I would recommend you make some temporary holding jig John.

I warned you to make sure and have two people that step.

I am quite sure you know what a t-bar is. As you roll the glass off, put a pre-made tbar with say a one foot piece of 2x6 against the wall; it won't be perfect, but using holding jigs is the only thing I have found to work.

I had to glass these beam sockets in and the glass was upside down and vertical only. The first day, I lost some 1708 prewetted panels and realized it was going to be impossible without a jig.

These are my extra hands.

 

Yes, I had come to the same conclusion.

 

Actually there were 2 of us, but I think 4 would have been necessary.