Glassing the Keel

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year!

A couple of days ago, we started glassing in the aft side of the new bulkheads, having finished the forward side a week or so earlier. As before, we made a big fillet of thickened epoxy and covered it with one layer of biax. Since it had been a number of days, we sanded the biax to insure a good bond with the next layer. This had the added benefit of smoothing out some rough edges and getting rid of stray fibers.

I know we talked about using slow hardener for the two layers of tooling cloth, but at 48 degrees F, I just couldn't see it working, so we went with medium. Heather agreed with me that maybe we should try doing it one layer at a time this time. To give ourselves as much working time as possible before the resin got too sticky, we mixed seperate batches for each side. After helping me get under way with the starboard side, Heather started in on the port side.

Maybe I'm predisposed to being frustrated by fiberglass work- my dad used to do a lot of it and really hated it- or maybe I just get frustrated easily. My side didn't seem to be going much better than it had on the forward side, but Heather's did. I somehow finally got all the wrinkles worked out, but even though I had a big headstart, Heather finished her side before me, and it looked better. She also managed to maintain good humor throughout, unlike me. Thanks to her words of encouragement, I did manage to regain a tenuous grasp on my composure.
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It's amazing what dinner and a few hours of cure time can do. I just went out to check on the heater- it's cold again tonight so the resin needs a little help- and the job looks great. Much better, I think, than the forward side. One layer to go!