Great..... This is what is in my future?   LOL, thanks for the heads up!

That sounds about right. Put another fill coat on then sand it off, again & again.

smiles, Ralph

Hey Scott, 

I feel your pain as I have just started putting on the coats -two so far, of varnish after a marathon session of sanding and prep. Having just gone through it, I can now say that it was absolutely worthwhile as the varnish is really looking great, and we all know that it's completely dependant on the prep eh? 

The one thing that I think I learned was that next time when it comes to applying the fill coats I might go a little heavier than rolling on three coats. I tried to keep it light, and did manage to get away with it, but everytime I started seeing the glass weave showing just under the surface I was sanding I started getting nervous! Needless to say, I had to add an extra rolled on coat of varnish -the thrid one, but still it was very thin and I was quite concerned about going through. I'm sure the "pros" would say that I did it just right -just enough to do the job of filling the weave and allow for sanding it smooth without any real extra weight, but wow that's work. Might have been easier to just brush on coats and have plenty of "room" to sand it smooth? Who knows...

Keep at it and remember it will turn out great! Oh yeah, the occassional adult beverage somehow seems to help too!

Cheers, 

Rob

If you are building a coffee table then you are stuck with sanding ad nosium. If you are finishing a boat that will  be dropped in parking lots, lashed to roof racks, bounced off rocks , and crunched on gravel beaches don't sweat the small stuff. Deal with major runs with a heat gun and a scaper. Sand to fair glass overlaps. Bright spots are not the end of the world. After 5 or 6 coats of varnish with wet sanding between, folks at the launch ramp will be telling how beautiful it looks. Just smile and thank them. Only you can see the glitches.

Perhaps I'm being too fastidious - I thought that the varnish wouldn't stick to any shiny spots of epoxy, thereby rendering them unprotected from UV rays; some of these spots are the size of the head of a pin.  Am I crazy?  Other sections don't seem shiny, they just have a (very) slight wavy pattern.  I might be somewhat hampered by my furniture making experience, forgetting that I'm building a boat not a piece of fine furniture (though just as beautiful).  Thanks for the sound reminder Catboater.  Yes, a few adult beverages never go amiss.

Thank guys.

Scott

I have built five,catboater is right, dont worry be happy.

Rob,

I'd recommend staying with the thin coats, but putting on more of them between sandings. Less chance of a drip that way and you'll have your extra "room" to help avoid sanding into the glass.

For everyone, another useful technique is not to recoat the entire boat at first. After the first sanding, only put on epoxy on the obvious low spots, and only sand the areas where the new epoxy is. Keep this up until the big low spots are filled in, then start coating and sanding the entire boat.

Laszlo

That is a great tip Laszio. I'm having a "Why didn't I think of that?" moment. I hope to be sanding about an acre of Peeler in the spring and this may save my sanity. Well, a little of it anyway. 

On my laptop now and spell check is telling me that it should be ad nauseam. Either way you may have saved my from some of that.

As always, thanks Lazlo for sharing your knowledge and insights - it's greatly appreciated! Don't worry, I'll be back to ask for your thoughts and opinions before too long! :)

Cheers, 

Rob

To Coco:  one furniture maker to another, yeah, these boats can drive you crazy.  I'm only on my second CLC build, and I'm sure there are lots of people out there with lots more experience than me, but here's what I've learned and what I'm attempting on my second boat.  I treat the sanding tha same way, and with the same mixture of dread and fear, as if I'm sanding a piece of thinly veneered furniture.  When I think I have enough epoxy on the glass and it looks like the weave is filled, I hit the drips and runs with a cabinet scraper and carbide tipped paint scraper to get things close to level, then I start with my random orbit sander, with a soft pad, on its middle speed with 150 grit paper to smooth it out.   80 or 120 grit does it faster, but I believe that this is one instance when speed is your enemy instead of your friend.  When it looks like I'm almost level but not quite, I stop using the power sander and go to 220 with a hand pad.   I think that taking it to totally level and then going to a finer grit simply takes off more epoxy than I want to, and gets me closer to that dreaded point when I have to lay on another coat of epoxy to cover my sand-throughs.  I never use the sander on the edges, only hitting them by hand with the 220.  Even then, it's astonishing how quickly I 've been able to go through 2 layers of glass to bare wood.  Oh, well, here we go again.  And I've found that the paper makes a huge difference.  Sandpaper manufacturers have years of experience coming up with special formulations to deal with sanding different materials, and the good stuff is really good.  I've found that Festool Granat is wonderful for sanding epoxy.  It hardly ever loads up, and does a wonderful job.  I found a round hand sander pad at Klingspor that's designed to hold 5" hook and loop discs, and it works beautifully.  Just soft enough to conform to kayak curves,  (Sorry, CLC, but you guys don't carry this pad, and I think you should.  Sometimes the best sanding paper is only available in round hook and loop format, and having a round pad to hold it is a real plus.)  As for the little pin head sized glossy spots, I was in the same predicament today and discovered that maroon scotchbrite will get down there and remove 90% of them, without continuing to thin out my already thin epoxy layer.  I decided to leave the rest alone and applied the first coat of varnish, and the remaining spots totally disappeared. As for longevity, we'll have to wait and see.

Sorry for running on and on.  The Adult Beverages are starting to kick in.

  I assume that you all are finishing bright, but what about painted surfaces? Is it necessary to put so much effort sanding the epoxy smooth? I was thinking I could fill any low spots with primer; dents, dings and voids with epoxy and micro balloons; and then put most of my effort into sanding the paint. Am I off base here? Should I plan on budgeting more time for filling and sanding epoxy?

Hi,

I'm building a Peeler Skiff and I made a choice before starting --- paint is good.  I'm planning on fishing and digging clams in Narragansett Bay, just as I did as a kid 50 years ago   I'm building a boat to use, not to display.  I've done my time as a slave to brightwork.

Today's 1-part polyurethane paints are marvels of technology and far more UV resistant than even the best modern varnishes.  As I sand, feather, and fair the Peeler's taped joints, I am constantly reminded how much more work it would be if I were going to finish it bright.  There's enough sanding as it is.

Though I will readily admit the beauty of brightly finished wood, I, personally, am not willing to pay the price it demands.

De gustibus non est disputandum,

Regards,

Dick

Thanks for all the invaluable input.  I've used a Scothbrite-like pad to eliminate the shiny, pinhead-sized spots in my epoxy and this seems to have worked superbly (scuffed enough to accept varnish without removing too much epoxy - thanks to Peter Shapiro for that tip).  As I sand I, too, see the merits of an entirely painted craft - I'm buliding a wherry, so will paint the hull white, but have been captivated by the beauty of a varnished interior.  I'm looking forward to the ease of sanding the long, gently curved strakes rather than the fiddly interior bits.

To continue with the wonderful Latin aphorisms, DDowdell, I'm planning to name my boat AD REMOS

Si ventus non est. te confers ad remos - If there is no wind, take to the oars (literally and figuratively).

Thanks again to everyone.

Scott

To Chester:  I'm painting the hull of the WoodDuck with polyurethane and leaving the deck bright.  I used a tip from Laslzo to save all the work and weight of filling the weave with epoxy and instead used a slurry of epoxy and micro-ballons on the glass.  One coat of this got me to the point where I could sand it smooth and ready for my primer.  I found on my Kaholo build that the primer won't do a great job of filling defects unless they're very small, and that using micro-ballons and epoxy works much better.  And it sands very easily.

Repeat after me, Sanding is fun, sanding is fun, sanding is fun, sanding is fun...............

Peter, when you say slurry, are you talking honey consistency? Is it able to be poured (eventually) or is is closer to a thinner mayonnaise type mix? 

  Also, do you just prime over sanded micro-balloons or do they need a coat of epoxy to seal them? I assume that they will not absorb moisture. 

I like it about the thickness of a cake frosting. The thicker the slurry, the lighter it is and easier to sand. If you want a really hard surface, make it runny. Thick slurries are harder to spread, though. But you can always thin them with more epoxy.

Some people say you have to fill it with epoxy because sanding breaks open the balloons, but I just primed over them with a high build primer and then (after lots of sanding and more priming and more sanding) painted it with a 2-part linear polyurethane, cross-linking the last coat. Absolutely no problem with moisture absorption

Good luck,

Laszlo

OK, enough perfectionism.  Are you trying to make the rest of us feel inferior?

 All of my kayaks have drips from epxoy and varnish. You can see where the fiberglass overlaps if you look carefully.  I can not see that it effects the handling at all. I never sand finer than 150 on epoxy and use scotchbrite pads between varnish coats.  

People still will not let me launch without coments about how pretty the boats are.

My goal, get it on the water and have fun. Scratches are part of the esthetic. 

Not that I do not appreciate beautiful work, but....

My 1.5 cents.

Happy paddling, Ed

  EdBru, my pattern seems to be to build something as carefully and with as much thought (drinking a beer and staring at it) as I can. Then finish it to as high a level as possible followed by neglecting and beating the crap out of it for ever after. Repeating as necessary as long as my interest holds out. Right now I am at the beginning of a cycle.......

Definately support the idea of a thinking chair, preferably a rocker and a place to put the beer down.  Would really like to have the border collie at my feet but did not want to get epoxy dust in his fur. 

Happy Thanksgivnncah to all