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wrote:
30. JIMinFL

I think you could strip all the gelcoat entirely off a boat and it
would still float. If the fibers were adequately wetted out with resin,
the hull wouldn't even absorb water (or "wick" it around). That seems
to be where we disagree.

Now you are qualifing with "adequately wetted out with resin". Sure
some
better hulls will be more resistant to water penetration. The cheaper
hulls
still depend on the gel coat to keep the water out

******

:-)

When one states that water is going to leak through the frp laminate
and into the boat unless it is somehow stopped by the gelcoat- and if
one means "if the hull is defective.......", then it would be best to
so state. When talking about general functions of gelcoat, laminate,
etc it would be customary to assume one is talking about a standard
hull rather than a defective one.

No builder depends on gelcoat to keep water from leaking into the
bilge.

Gee Chuck I think that's a bit of a statement. Most fibreglass
laminates are pretty porous if there are no barriers.

I'm not saying water would "flow" as such, but certainly it will seep
into the glass & definitely damage it over time.

On the other side if anyone did actually wet the layup enough that it
was truly water "proof" then it would be a very weakened laminate,
overly heavy & expensive waste of resin.

The best fix thus far is a good outer barrier usually of vinyl ester
resins in conjunction with a tissue tie layer. Even inside you need
flowcoat or such to stop the laminate being too porous from that direction.

K