C-Forum

I occassionally reapply epoxy to the hull of my boat. The James river here in town has been a little low and about every 3-4 weeks I sand down the bad scratch/gouges and reapply a few layers of epoxy.

Problem is, I use the West Systems epoxy with the slow hardner and it puts the boat out of comission for a couple days (adding layers and cure time). Is there any drawback to using a faster hardner for this so I can get it back on the water sooner or should I stick with the slow hardner?

Not so sure that you will get back on the water any faster using either the slow or fast hardner. Both require 1-4 days to achieve a full cure (although the temperature required for each to do so is different.)

Heat is the equalizing factor with epoxy. Bake your boat at 130 degrees F if you want a hard and fast cure.

Here is some reading if you are really concerned about such things:

http://www.westsystem.com/webpages/user ... 00-915.pdf

There is an 800 number included if you want to talk to a West System tech rep.

You could try some plastic or marine epoxy. I'm sure there are rolls of epoxy putties that cure quickly. I have a roll-up of PC-11 marine epoxy that I haven't tried yet, and a retailer here (Mountain Equipment Co-op) sells a tube of plastic epoxy for quick ABS repairs. Not sure of the cure times.

FYI, I had some leftover PC-7 epoxy from a repair, and I just spread it onto the bangs and cracks on my bow Royalex (no bangplate), just to see how it would hold up - but it's pretty brittle and basically cracks and chips off.

P.

I think Marshall is laying down epoxy resin on his glass boats. (He is a big person, and the sandstone in the low-water James River simply chews up his C-1 glass hulls! )

You got it Rump

Trying to do all I can to take care of the boat, I'd rather reapply epoxy on a regular basis and have the cheese-grater rocks gnaw that off than the fabric itself.