Re: To Open a Joint

Posted by Howard on Jan 29, 2006

Mac,

from your description, i am assuming you are dealing with a misaligned scarf joint used to create a panel and that the glass is on the inside of the panel for reinforcing purposes. if that is the case, you can try your approach and see what it yields...being careful not to burn anything.

if you are not successful being able to get the scarf to open up, or are concerned about making a mess of it, there is an alternate approach that can still allow you a bright finish. that is convert the misaligned scarf joint to a butt joint.

from the outside side of the misaligned panel, cut the panels apart along the current joint line. (i say the outside becuase when you cut it, the inside inside side of the panel will look like it has two joints about an 1 inch apart)

realign the panels properly and recut one of the panels with the proper angle so that when they butt up against one another, the panel is properly aligned. if you do this carefully you will lose only 1 to 3 millimeters of panel length. This will not make a difference when you stitch everything up.

to complete the butt joint, once you have the panels properly cut, lay the butted panels inside side up and aligned and epoxy putting three inch, 9oz tape down the middle of the joint. after this has cured, you now need to build up this joint. alternate three more pieces of tape putting the first piece one inch out to the right of the bottom tape, the second pieces one inch out to the left of the bottom tape and the third piece right on the top of the bottom tape. put a final layer of 6oz cloth approximately 7" wide on top of the previous layers. (this should do the job and is the same layup as the arctic hawk's butt joints.)

if there is a sheer clamp eventually involved on the panel, you will have to adjust the layup on the panel not to build it up under the location of the expected sheer clamp.

good luck

howard

In Response to: To Open a Joint by Mac on Jan 29, 2006

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