"Jim Conlin" wrote ...
I figure it'd be somewhat over $10/ft^2.
Core-cell $4-
maybe 4 laminations of:
12 oz. knitted Glass $10/yd = $.80/ft^2/ply
epoxy $70/gal = $.60/ft^2/ply

paint $1/ft^2
plus abrasives, peel ply, fillers, vacuum bag consumables

Vacuum bagging it would be the way to go for bond strength,
but knitted glass? I didn't think that was all that cost
effective?

One thing I would like to mention is that hardware store
F'glass cloth is NOT worth it. It's actually a bit more
expensive than most mail order, plus it's crappy quality.

John M wrote:
Just wondering do you guys that use epoxy for everything also use titanium
for auto body repairs after all it's better than steel. It seems rather
silly to repair a polyester and glass boat which is old with epoxy and the
latest high tech fabrics. Why not try resin infusion too


Actually, it's not silly at all. Secondary bonding with
polyester is rather iffy... nowhere near as strong and
what's more important, less reliable (more prone to voids,
imperfectly mixed resin, more temp sensitive, etc etc) so
it's less likely to achieve it's best strength. Epoxy is not
that much more expensive (considering the expense entailed
by owning the rest of the boat too) and that little extra is
very well worth it IMHO.

The last boat I did extensive rebuild work on was an old
Lightning... considering that I bought new trailer tires &
bearings (or would you advocate buying cheaper used ones?),
new running rigging, new sails, and fairly nice paint (now
this could have been economised on, but would it have looked
as good), the 2 gallons of epoxy that I used to do
structural work was trivial... and I sailed that boat in 20+
knot winds many times, never broke anything that I'd worked
on with epoxy. The first few times I was nervous, but after
that became very confident in the strength of my work. BTW
this included relamating some patches of deck as well as
installing a new mainsheet bridle & traveller, which comes
under quite heavy strain.

OTOH I have seen other boats suffer structural failure in
strong winds... it doesn't look like much fun, but perhaps
the skippers are telling themselves they're glad they didn't
spend the money as they take the pieces home.

DSK