Cedar strip fiberglass help!!!!

[kmerr98277]

I am building a cedar strip canoe with west 105/207. I was told to put a piece of cloth over the entire hull and then a football shaped one on top of that. When classing the edge of the football piece started to string out. The fibers began to string out. I have one coat on now and it is drying. Looks stringy from ten feet away. Will the other coats cover this or can I sand it when it cures? This is my first canoe. Thanks

[JimD]

The fill coats of epoxy will likely not embed the errant strands of cloth weave but you should have no trouble sanding those glass fiber strands afterward. Imho almost anything is better than having fully cured epoxy on cloth without the weave filled so I would just keep adding fill coats every few hours until the weave is filled.

[sailcanoefan]

Yep. I agree with JimD. Wait epoxy cures about 36 hours then sand strands decreasing to 0 thickness to get a nice finish.
Don't sand much all the good surface, because the cloth could be weakened. After having sanding all the surface, put a thin layer of epoxy all over and sand when cured. A 3rd thin layer of epoxy is recommended but not mandatory.

Finish job with 2 parts polyurethane varnish UV protection. Remember, epoxy is sensitive to UV.

[Canoez]

I am building a cedar strip canoe with west 105/207. I was told to put a piece of cloth over the entire hull and then a football shaped one on top of that. When classing the edge of the football piece started to string out. The fibers began to string out. I have one coat on now and it is drying. Looks stringy from ten feet away. Will the other coats cover this or can I sand it when it cures? This is my first canoe. Thanks

The strings should sand off - avoid sanding into the base cloth. When sanded and varnished, you might see a little bit of the glass where it has been sanded depending on how fine you sand the glass. Be sure to wait for the resin to be fully cured before sanding.

FYI - We typically would put the "football" under the complete piece of cloth and then apply resin. We do this to avoid disturbing the cut fibers at the edge of the football. Some parts of a piece cut into a football shape will be "bias cut" but other portions will not and will fuzz up like crazy.

[Canoez]

Yup. Sharp cabinet scraper works well, too. The scraper sometimes works well when the epoxy is a bit green, but not too much as you can get the epoxy to "tear" when a bit gummy.

[Oldad]

Yup. Sharp cabinet scraper works well, too. The scraper sometimes works well when the epoxy is a bit green, but not too much as you can get the epoxy to "tear" when a bit gummy.

I'm a big fan of using a sharp scraper too. When it is just right the scraper can sculpt green epoxy, takes patience but worth it in time save later. Putting the football piece on first might have saved some aggravation.

[JimConlin]

Particularly if the epoxy is still a little green(soft), you might be able to pare off and errant strand with a sharp chisel. If that's not productive, I'd favor the scraper.

[kmerr98277]

Thanks for the input! Yeah it was a very frustrating experience that should have been more enjoyable...but i guess you have to learn some lessons the hard way.

[Todd Bradshaw]

Green epoxy-saturated fibers can often micro-fracture if sanded or scraped. Structurally, it's not enough of a fracture to be any kind of problem, but under a clear varnished finish, they can tend to turn sort of white-ish and no amount of resin or varnish is ever going to fix that and turn them back to clear. I'd much rather see you go ahead and apply your filler coats (as many as it takes to completely cover the weave and then one more for a little sanding cushion) and then wait about a week for a complete cure. Then you can go in sanding or scraping without the risk of bruising green fiberglass and remove whatever remnants of the strands the filler coats didn't cover.

And yes, next time put your partial layer under the full layer. As long as you don't agitate the resin too much as you apply it (which can trap tiny air bubbles down in the glass) you can apply and saturate both layers of cloth at once. It will generally yield the lightest boat, the highest fiber to resin ratio for strength, and the smoothest transition where the number of cloth layers changes.