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Resins, Fillers and glues
Wow! That's a big chest! You filler selection sounds zooper dooper to me, although until just recently, I didn't realize that maple trees bloomed. When on a walk down by the river the other day, I noticed that the big-leaf Canadian variety had blooms on them ...all my life living around maples and I'd never noticed that before! Maple Flowers! (I bet collecting them up is a bugger tho' ....) My standard filler selections: Small boats, a.k.a. low physical stress boats: Maple wood flour plus about 15% silica for everything except fairing. Fairing uses phenolic microballoons (plus a little silica), although I want to try the new QuikFair from System Three ...I hate breathing any more powders than I have too. Bad enough that I have to breath sanded wood and epoxy ...and yes, I use a respirator. Nothing's perfect and the shop often contains fine stuff that you can hardly see in the air. I imagine that it collects in my lungs .... Larger boats: I use silica/epoxy slurry for laminations, drilling witness holes to ensure an even squeeze everywhere. For high strength gap filling adhesive and highest strength fillets (under glass), I use 50/50 milled glass fiber and silica to thicken the epoxy. For unglassed fillets, I use straight silica (smooth). For all glassed fillets, I use the aforementioned 85% wood flour/15% silica mix. For fairing, I'm using phenolic microballoons (plus a little silica). I haven't experimented with cotton fiber. After hearing lists of complaints from those using plastic fillers, I don't bother trying it. Brian -- http://www.advantagecomposites.com/tongass -- My 22' Tolman Skiff project http://www.advantagecomposites.com/catalog -- Discounted System Three Resins products .. "Backyard Renegade" wrote in message m... "Brian D" wrote in message news:cdGmc.43368$0H1.3993970@attbi_s54... Cotton fibers or wood flour are better for your size of boats, Scotty ...can't remember the WEST designations for these (and you have to ask them what is in many of their fillers anyway...) Brian (puffs up chest) Yeah, I got my fillers all set man, I've built over 50 of these size boats For the record, I use aerosil, maple flower, and pine flower in different mixes depending on what I am doing. Between the three I get what I need. For backings and wood and gap filling I use wood, mistakes are recut, not filled, I know this is not always practical in larger vessels. Scotty -- http://www.advantagecomposites.com/tongass -- My 22' Tolman Skiff project http://www.advantagecomposites.com/catalog -- Discounted System Three Resins products . "Backyard Renegade" wrote in message om... Glenn Ashmore wrote in message news:Csqmc.7893$Lm3.270@lakeread04... Parallax wrote: My epoxy is 10 yr old West System stuff and my metering pumps broke yrs ago so my mixing is prob a little off. I am using the colloidal silica I used yrs ago for blister repair and it seemed to work then but I may not be using the righ amount. Today, I plan to buy another gallon of the West epoxy, pumps and fibers. Milled fiber does not thicken epoxy very well. While it is great for strong bonding it will definitely not make epoxy stiff enough to keep it from sagging. For fairing and filling I mix in microballoons first then slowly add silica to get the right consistancy. I don't use milled fibers. I tried them once but the lamination it created left the epoxy stiff. For the type of construction I do, stiff is not necessarily good. Scotty |