Tips Taped, Seat Backside Glassed

On Sunday I spent time removing the excess glass and resin from Saturday's wrapping of the stabilizer bottoms and sides. It was definitely too late, but I realized that the cloth didn't need to extend up the side more than a couple of inches. This would have removed any need to trim the excess glass, and would almost certainly have prevented excess resin from dripping down the side and off the top of the overturned stabilizers. The end result would have been a bit lighter, too. Oh, well - next time!

The resin covered interior face of the seat back panel managed to get imprinted with the wrinkled shrink wrap plastic that kept the paint can and the iron block free from sticking. It took a bit of sanding to flatten the pattern, but it was still visible.

Hand sanding the fillet managed to nearly finish off the abrasive coated sanding mesh I was using, but what really started doing it in was hand sanding the bumps and excess glass on the stabilizers. I finally gave up and resorted to the belt sander. That was much faster, perhaps a little too fast in some areas - which will need some re-application of glass and resin - and a bit too slow in others.

Regardless, it looks like there will be a lot of sanding in my future, coupled with applying more resin to smooth out the fabric pattern.





For the seat back I cut a piece of 6 oz glass "boat" cloth, and made sure it covered the side panels and seat back. I then took some 12 oz 45/45 degree knit cloth pieces that I had cut originally to be used to wrap the ends of the stabilizers, but decided were too thick for that purpose, and fit them over the fillet areas. This should help spread the forces from the seat to the rest of the seat back structure.

I removed the cloth, smeared resin on the panels, and applied the 6 oz cloth. It was somewhat of a pain to get it to cover the seat back, the fillet and both sides without there being any air gaps, bubbles or excess cloth at the fillets or on the sides.

Trying to wet out the 12 oz cloth in place was worse. It took a lot of resin and a lot of kneading it into the cloth before the silvery white cloth finally turned translucent. The loose ends tended to fuzz, and generally made a mess. I'm sure glad that this side won't be visible!

With the remaining resin I wet the tips of the stabilizers in preparation for taping.

I took some 6 oz glass tape, cut it into short segments, and applied them to the tips of the stabilizers on top of the resin. The width of the tape would have been nearly a perfect match for the bows, but I decided instead to run the tape vertically. This way the ends would overlap the top and bottom of the tips, where they could be folded over and better cover the plywood.

Again I used my gloved fingertips to work the resin into the cloth, pulling the resin soaked fabric against the panels on both sides simultaneously with thumb and forefingers.

Once the cloth was soaked and in position, some shrink wrap plastic pouches were used to cap the ends. Using some scrap foam rubber to wrap around the tips, and pairs of 1/2" boards and C-clamps, pressure was applied to the tips to provide a poor man's vacuum bag.

It was time to call it a day!