Fiberglassing

After the blog post about how to mix the epoxy for fiberglassing, it is time to post about the actual fiberglassing. The process is actually quite simple, seeing that I read so much about it that I was so nervous. But my neighbor was there to help me apply my first coat and he assured me that it was not that complicated. The night before I had clean the canoe surface with a cloth and had blown out the entire area around the canoe with a pneumatic blower. Before fiberglassing, I thought sanding would never end and I thought of giving up the whole project all together, because of the monotony of it, yet the fun of fiberglass totally made up for it. First, I laid out the 4 oz. cloth and wet it out with the mixture of epoxy and hardener. After 24 hours, when this dried I did it again. So now I had 8 ounces of cloth all the way around the entire canoe. However, after each cloth dried, the excess had to be cut off with a knife or scissors (which ever was more accessible.) The bottom picture is the canoe after two coats of epoxy. I laid 6 oz. Fiberglass tape on the stems to ensure strength and the tape needs a couple more coats to fully wet out. But in all this step was a lot of fun because you could see the beauty of the colors become very vibrant, when you were so used to seeing whitish sanded wood. The next step is to sand the fiberglass to ensure that it is smooth throughout...

Mixing Epoxy for Fiberglassing

As stated before, the next step was to fiberglass the canoe, so I decided to make a post about how I mixed the epoxy resin. I know that from the preliminary setup I said I was going to buy West System, but after talking with my advisor, I learned that US Composites was a much cheaper and even better product. It was a better product because it could be handled without gloves or respirator mask, not to mention that it more user friendly for novice fiberglassers like myself. Buying the 2 gallons of 635 Thin Epoxy Resin Sytem kit which included 85 oz. of 3:1 Medium Epoxy Hardener, I thought a 3:1 ratio would be the best because it does not dry too slow or too fast. Also I bought a 25 pack of 5 in. squeegees, which were life savers, 2 mini pumps, and 20 yards of 4 oz. Fiberglass. Usually cedar strip canoes are glassed with 6 oz. cloth, but my advisor said that using 4 oz. cloth is much easier to work with than the heavier 6 oz. Also, I bought a 36 pack of 2 in. brushes from Harbor Freight Tools. These were the all the materials that I bought, and yes I did buy extras. The actual mixing of the epoxy was quite simple. The first step was to measure the weight of the cup or container. I used a Fage Yogurt Container. Then place the scale on how much 635 epoxy you want (around 300g -400g) After pouring in the epoxy, it is important to remeasure the scales to determine how much you actually have. Subtracting the cup weight from the total sum and dividing by three, that is how much hardener you need to add. Adding the hardener amount to the cup and epoxy, not just epoxy, you need to place the scales at that weight. After everything is poured in, it needs to be mixed with a drill. I used an electric drill and a mixer my neighbor gave me. With the epoxy and hardener mixed, I could now pour it onto the canoe.

Wood Filling and Sanding

After the cedar strips and stems were finished, the next step was to wood fill and sand the strips smooth. Buying Elmer's wood filler, multiple brass screws and 80, 120, and 180 grit from Lowes, the next step was not only time consuming but a bit monotonous a times. Starting out by filling in the hull and the staple holes, I tried to fill in all the gaps between the strips. If I was to do this step again, I would not have mixed in cedar saw dust to the wood filler because this lessened the effect of the filler, which was generally sanded off instead of bonding the gaps. While listening to an audiobook on my itouch, the time seemed to pass a little quicker as I moved from 80 grit sandpaper to eventually 180 grit. At the end of sanding, the garage would have been filled deep in dust were in not for the box fan filtration system and good weather to keep the garage door open. The next step was the much look forward to step. Fiberglassing...

Building the Outer Stems.

Building the outer stems was one of the funnest parts of building the canoe yet because it was one of the first pieces of the canoe that was not repetitive. First, I screwed the stems to the bow and stern of the canoe. However, before these were attached, I had to sand down the edges of the strips to make sure they were flush with the outer stems. Second, I sight lined the flow of the canoe and drew a pencil line of this curvature, making sure that both sides were nearly the same. Then taking the two pieces of white oak downstairs to the work room, I cut the top piece of the stem with the band saw and sanded it down. I tried to make this piece as straight as possible, so it would be flush with the bilge of the canoe. Then, I sanded the edges on the horizontal orbital sander to form more of a blunt point. (If that even makes sense...) Then gluing the piece back onto the canoe, I screwed it back in to ensure that it would join to the cedar. When I eventually sanded the entire hull of the canoe, I sanded down the edges of the outer stems a bit more because of the wood filler, which brings me to the next step. Wood filling...

Removing the Staples

 The next step was to now remove the staples and how glad I was for the Q-Tip idea. As silly as it was, the Q-Tips provided a space big enough for a regular screwdriver. Seeing that I went through the box of 650 Q-Tips and a couple hundred extra from another box and a couple hundred 1/2in. staples from the staple gun, I think I had to pull over 1000 staples from the Canoe frame. Some were harder to pull then others, especially the ones stapled into the white oak stems. Trying not to hurt the canoe when prying the staples out, I placed another screwdriver done to be used as a fulcrum. The next step after pulling the staples was to add the outer stems of the canoe...

Stripping the Canoe Part III

 The last and final step in stripping the canoe was the final strip on the top and the bottom strips at the bow and stern. The bottom strips were glued and stapled just as every other strip was done, but were much shorter. In increments of three strips, as pictured, I wanted to follow a natural curve for the build up to the bow and stern. The strips were cut with a dremmel and the canoe began to look very "canoe-ish." The strip on the top was not whiter western red cedar because the two pieces I was thinking about were not white on the top and bottom, which I did not think was going to look good. Measurements were made to ensure that the top strip fit the curve of the strips at the hull. The two pieces were glued together, cut on the band saw, and then sanded to fit. Unfortunately, the top strip didn't fit as well as I had hoped it would of. The next step was to the laborious process of removing staples. 

Stripping the Canoe Part 2

 As I continued to strip the canoe, the process became easier and harder. It was easier because the strips were getting smaller and smaller, yet the angle became more severe around the hull from the stem-line to the bottom of the canoe. Without the cove and bead of the strips, I think stripping the canoe would be an impossibility. Using the Q-Tip method to provide a little space to expose the staple, each strip was stapled first to Station #0. A lot of stress was placed to get this strip in place due to the wood not wanting to curve with the canoe. However, once the middle was stapled the middle rest of the strips were much easier to staple. Once the strips had worked themselves up and no longer needed to be connected to the stern and bow, I had to cut each strip with the cutting blade on a Dremmel so it would fit in place. I went through more than about half gallon of Titebond III to glue the strips together at this point. I still need to strip the middle of the canoe which I will use Western Red Cedar which is colored through with white, and the rest of the bottoms of the stern and bow. Throughout the stripping process, I tried to make sure that all the staples lined up, so when they are removed there will be a line of very small holes, which instead of taking away from the beauty of the canoe can actually enhance it. Finally, the next step once the stripping is complete is to remove all the staples, fill in the slights and openings and then sand it smooth.