Nida-Core: Looking for thoughts & feedback

This is sitting in my garage almost finished. It's 100% plascore epoxy and fiberglass. I've notice no material thermal deformation or softness in up to 100*F heat and sunshine. White color of course. I'll paint it white. It's a fine material for small boats IMO.

Plascore was easy to work with, shipped and arrived on time. Price was good. And they can provide it already pre-CNC cut and pre-glassed with a variety of fiberglass options already done. I wish in retrospect that I would have done that.

It can be harder to make joints in some cases due to filling the end of the honeycomb, but it's not too bad with the right consistency of compound. It probably also takes more epoxy because you need to wet the glass and the scrim layer. I have had a couple issues with starving the layup at first, but I've got it figured out pretty well by now. I ordered a bit of extra so I still have about 6 sheets left over. I would get a few extra pieces to experiment with. It's cheap enough that you can afford to do that.

I don't any long term use to base an opinion on, but I will in a few years.

What I can say is that it's extremely tough in destructive testing of sample pieces I've made.

 

Had a question about joining at the chines. Do you just cut each end piece at an angle so that the edges meet up? Or are they cut as a straight edge, ends filled in, and the chine filled with some other material?

 

I'Ve seen both, makes more sense to cut to an angel and apply more glass to the seam rather then fill with thickened goo that doesn't stick that well.

when laying on the glass a HD foam can be applied to the edges so goo will stick.

 

wouldn't use nidaplast for a hull unless its a lightweight kept on the hard out of water. Straight cut better with a stiff epoxy bog pressed firmly into pre- epoxy wetted ends to put a manageable radius on the chine . If you're making a chined hull, pre glass the inside or outside (only one - your choice) of your pre cut nidaplast panels face down , flat onto a shiny flat surface that has been drowned with release agent . You can vac bag this way , (but if you vac bag glass facing up, gravity will fill the honeycomb with resin as it soaks through the surface scrim). When you peel it off, you'll find a hard glossy surface to your nidaplast which will still flex quite well since it has only one side glassed. -- still dont like it for a hull unless its a small lightweight , but good luck with your project

 

Well, I'm looking at building a catamaran, so I don't intend to have any hard chines on the hull (besides the bow I suppose). With the flexibility of honeycomb, I see no need to have any chines, just shape em with a little heat if necessary.

From what I have read, the scrim melts at 240Celsius, while the core melts at 160Celsius, so you simply apply a heat iron until reach around 90 degrees and then shape. You can even get this stuff to work around indents that way, by melting the core partially and then fitting.

 

Some interesting info on this page;
http://boatcraft.com.au/Shop/index....=56_58&zenid=e4cb5b1be756a3b2f6c50bc65a7ca723
particularly the "how to work it" page.

My thoughts were to work it like a tortured ply hull, join it down the keel and fold it up !

 

All of my chines were cut at 90* to the surface of the panel. I cut them using a following router with a fiberglass specific bit and wood patterns. The joints are filled with an epoxy bog in a one step process. The exposed ends of all of the cells that are cut are filled along with the joint. Then while still pliable I wet the joint and apply a 6" wide biaxial tape. The final joint requires some, but not a lot of additional fairing. The lower portion of the hull has an additional full layer of 12oz biax.

The plascore works very well. I have found no issues so far with delamination. The adhesion to the core is to a bonded veil fabric. It's as strong or stronger than any adhesion to foam I've been around. Foam core doesn't stick to its self very well, so peeling back the glass is usually also peeling the first layer of the foam. The internal strength of the PP honeycomb in tension is probably orders of magnitude greater than PVC foam. But the failure would be the vail to core bond. If you infuse, the mfg will leave periodic spaced cells open to fill and create direct epoxy bridges between the FRP on each side. I did not do this.

Here's a pic of the boat on the water:

 

Nice tri Jetboy. How is she holding up after a couple of years?

Are you able to estimate how much weight you have saved compared to a plywood hull?

I have started on a small sailing tender (10ft) using 5mm nidaplast. 10mm core would have given me the required strength and stiffness (1/4" plywood equivalent) with very little glass but the resulting skin thickness would have had very little puncture resistance.

I have not tried stitching 5mm pvc foam but I doubt it would hold wire stitches as well as the nidaplast. I did not pre-glass the panels but did saturate the scrim on the inner faces with epoxy. A strip of glass tape on either side of each free edge would have made handling and stitching a bit easier but I still managed to get the shape and fairness I want with a bit of additional support here and there.