Canoe Paddle Blade - Fiberglass and Epoxy
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- Опубліковано 12 сер 2014
- Part of a DIY paddle project is a layer of fiberglass and epoxy over one or both sides of the paddle blade. Quietwater paddle kits come with enough four ounce fiberglass cloth and two part epoxy to cover front and back of the blades on both paddles that you build from the kit.
Remember with paddle kits from quietwater you do not need any power tools. All the ripping and cutting have been done. Your part of the project requires only your hands.
Our standard kit is cedar and poplar, but you also have a wide range of wood to choose from for blade, shaft, handle and trim if you want to make customize your paddles. - Навчання та стиль
Have to agree with mewolf1.Your cloth is floating with resin between the wood and cloth. Vacuum bagging is a method, that gives great strength with less weight. A great trick, without vacuum bagging, is to use Peel Ply. One thin coat of resin, then lay on the peel ply. After the resin has set, remove the peel ply. One more thin coat, and you are done. Just trying to help you produce an even better paddle. I like the homemade foam brush !
Nice job...just about to glass up 8 bent shaft paddles myself in the next couple days.
Hi all - It's been awhile since this flurry of activity. I've not had a reoccurrence of this bizarre fish eye 'behavior', but a few thoughts have occurred that further explain my perspective on epoxy and fiberglass and paddle blades.
#1 - To each their own. There's not an absolute, there is beaucoup knowledge gained via experience, as the responders have pointed out! That's the big reason there's enough wood and material in quietwater paddle kits to make TWO paddles. The first paddle gives you a 'taste' and some perspective on how to work with wood, hand tools, your hands and 'foreign substances' like epoxy and fiberglass. The second paddle benefits from what you learned on the first one.
#2 - A paddle blade is a small project. It's not a canoe or even the side of canoe, it's more like a shoebox. So I don't worry about the weight of the epoxy all that much, even if I use too much, as some have pointed out, we're still talking about less than an ounce difference between 'optimum' and what I apply. A brush continues to be my preferred spreader, mainly because the hard edges of a spreader tend to move the cloth around too much. For me, I feel that I have better control while moving the epoxy around with soft brush bristles rather than the hard corners and edges of a spreader. The piece of cloth is too small. A spreader DEFINITELY has its place, although for me, that is on a bigger surface area like the bottom of a paddle board.
#3 - Multiple coats are a good thing. Filling the weave is ideal with that first pour, but I never quite achieve that goal. So a second pour to fill the weave and sometimes even a third pour are needed to get it where I want the surface to be.
As others point out though - extra epoxy does add unneeded weight AND epoxy beyond what is need to fill the weave is generally not necessary. For one side of a paddle blade my first pour is three tablespoons. A second coat is three teaspoons. Again, were talking very small quantities, a big difference relative to the amounts needed for a canoe or other boat-sized project. As above having that first paddle to 'learn' on is a big deal. Most people that buy the kits have never done anything with epoxy or fiberglass before.
I am happy they want to try and hope that a two paddle kit works out for them!
@QuietwaterPaddles What type of resin do you prefer? Is there a certain name brand you like? Thanks for the video and advice.
fisheyes are a job issue to some degree. my suggestion is to not pour, unless squeegee excess resin out, then fill weave with second and third coats. better finish and lamination. when pouring, the cloth can literally " float" in the resin.
+mewolf1 It's worth a try. If a different method wrt the first coat ends up making the second 'fill-in' coat better (e.g. no fish eyes) - that would certainly be a good thing.
The glass is floating, and not to the wood as it should be. If you wet out the wood first then lay down the cloth and wet out, but without excess resin, the bond will be much better. Fill coats after. No offense intended, just been doing this for some time.
+mewolf1 not sure what you are referring to? If the fisheyes - I don't see them in the initial pour, I see them in the smaller secondary pour.
As for wetting the wood first, in my experience (also for a long time) I find it easier to place small pieces of cloth on dry wood. To your point I do wait until I see the epoxy soaking through the cloth and wetting the wood before I do any spreading or brushing. Once this saturation occurs, the cloth adheres to the surface and does not move when I begin spreading the epoxy. Even then any spreading is with minimal downward pressure. As with so many other things, finesse tends to succeed way more often than brute strength.
You need to learn more about epoxy before describing your technique as "finesse".
I must add that you make nice Paddles, and in no way mean to disuade anyone from them. Just mean to help improve them.
+mewolf1 no worries. The best kind of problems are the solved ones!
Hello, do you send the book and the DVD to Brazil?
Hi all
Lots of updates since I poured this epoxy. I'll get more videos on this channel as soon as I can! wrt Lumberjack and Natty yes I have tried other epoxy brands. MAS, EcoPoxy, and TotalBoat are all on my bench now. They're all good and workable epoxys. MAS has no amine blush which is nice. The other two require a post-cure warm water wipe down to get rid of the amine blush. EcoPoxy is a "friendly" product with ingredients that are eco-friendly. Thus the name. Based on hazelnut (?) if I remember correctly.
When you are pouring epoxy, make sure you do not spread it "too thin". This is hard to define, but you know you went too thin when you see "fisheyes" in the dried surface of the epoxy. Based on my experience, it looks to me like when I spread epoxy too thin, it's like I am "stretching" it over the surface. The wet epoxy reaches some limit and then it "snaps" apart" and retracts back to a "location" where it "re-achieves" some level of thickness. The remnant of the "snap apart" looks like a round hole in the epoxy. A fisheye.
Moral of the story from my pov is to avoid spreading the epoxy too thin. Be conservative, e.g. make 4 tsps for the second pour instead of 3, better to have too much and minimize spreading rather than too little and end up really working the wet epoxy to get it to cover the area. Overworking it and spreading it too thin, are what I think cause these "snapback holes" "fisheyes" to appear in what was a good looking smooth surface when the epoxy was wet and you left the room.....
A good way to estimate the amount of epoxy needed is to weigh the cloth on a digital scale. An example would be if the cloth weighs 3 oz, then mix a little more then 3 oz of epoxy. Normally its a 1 to 1 ratio, but mixing more epoxy then the weight of the cloth leaves room for error/loss
What do you do with the edge of the blade after you have glassed both sides?
Hi Chris - A couple things here - #1 Fiberglass does not like bending around sharp edges. You likely discovered that already, though. A quarter inch wide strip of glass is not really feasible, either. Happily, by the time you get done brushing the epoxy around the blade surfaces, there should be plenty of epoxy that went over the edge and 'coated' that edge. If not, just spend a few minutes wiping your brush along the edges. Nothing heavy or it will drip off. Do it a few times over a couple days and gradually build up the epoxy on the edges. While this is not reinforced with the glass fibers, after curing for a few days, it will be quite hard and durable AND waterproof, so that edge should have plenty of protection.
I like adding strips of wood along the edge. Purpleheart is one of my favorites. Just about any wood is going to be harder than western red cedar, so that hardwood edge strip with epoxy on top of it should offer plenty of protection from hitting the blade against the gunwale, or rocks or big fish....
hope that helps! Jeff
Do you only fiberglass one side of the paddle? Does that provide enough strength?
I apply four ounce fiberglass to both sides of the blade. This video just shows the one side. If memory serves, as soon as this was dry I flipped it over and did the other side.
@@QuietwaterPaddles What I have been doing lately to save on weight is to add fiberglass cloth to one full side and then only fiberglass cloth up half-way on the other side. It think this gives me enough strength without adding unnecessary weight to the paddle.
@@explorermike19 For me, there's a pretty wide spectrum when it comes to weight, even on a paddle blade. For those who might do just one big trip a year with one of the goals being to enjoy high mileage days on the water, then yes what you do should work just fine. For others, a spin around the lake after work is the frequent choice. That's more of what I tend towards. In that scenario, for me, weight doesn't matter. If weight was a higher priority, I would first lose about forty pounds off of me, rather than an ounce off a paddle blade.
You could also look at using a two ounce weight of fiberglass cloth. I've built a few paddles with that, but at the end of the day I like four ounce plain weave cloth and MAS epoxy with medium hardener. Easy to work, adds a bunch of strength and stiffness, and lets the wood shine through.
@@QuietwaterPaddles That makes good sense. I agree that for short paddle trips, weight is not a big deal and for a LOT of people, paddles get banged around a lot, thrown into cars and trunks and used for poling along the shallow sea floor as well as paddling, so durability if important. For longer paddling, a little extra weight wouldn't seem to make much difference and for me it doesn't because I have hugely strong arms and upper strength. However, I notice that most of my friends naturally gravitate toward their lighter weight paddles when they have other paddles to chose from. A lot of my friends carry wood paddles as spares, but primarily paddle with carbon fiber. I agree with you that 4 ounce fiberglass cloth seems to work better than 2 ounce.
What kind of epoxy did you use?
I like MAS brand epoxy. I used it for the blade in this video and continue using it as I type this in November 2020. For small quantity 'pots', like the ~three tablespoon-sized pours I do for a typical paddle blade, a 2:1 ratio is easy to measure out and pour from the resin and hardener containers. Other brands use different ratios of hardener to resin, which can make it hard to measure and pour a small volume of the hardener. Nothing wrong with other brands of epoxy, I just like how easy it is to measure and pour small quantities of MAS resin and hardener.
3 tablespoons?
The MAS is a 2:1 ratio of resin to hardener, and a three tablespoon pot is about the right amount. The mixing cup is small, the blade is small, and measuring spoons from the kitchen were on hand. Most important is the ratio
You are using way to much epoxy! You will not gain strength doing that, only weight. Use as little epoxy as possible while still saturating the whole cloth ofcourse. Then come back after it has hardened a bit and do 1-2 topcoats until you have filled in the texture of the cloth.
jonnebanan so how much better is this than just a typical finished wood paddle blade? Does the blade wear at all? You could put some funky deal on underneath that probably and they wouldn't get scratched off?
The glass makes the blade tougher, more resistant to scratches and dings.
As jonnebanan said, more epoxy doesn't add strength. Your initial fill coat should saturate the glass and make it clear, but there should be fiberglass weave showing when it hardens...then add top coats to fill the low spots.
A squeegee works better than a brush to push the glass down in the epoxy puddle and scrape off the excess.
Epoxy resin DOES add strength. Try and break a piece after it's hardened. You're repeating the old rules about polyester resin. Still, less resin to glass gives a higher strength to weight ratio.
@@UguysRnuts Yes, sorry. I should have written "adding more epoxy -only adds a tiny bit more- strength, but mostly just more weight. You are correct.
@@shawnharris5734 It may be stating the obvious, but epoxy seals the wood and prevents the wood surface from absorbing any water. A tip guard on the bottom end besides hardening the bottom, also seals the end grain from additional water absorption.
As mewolf says...too much epoxy...the ideal ratio is the exact amount by weight...not volume... to equal the weight of the cloth...a TINY bit more if you dont want the weave to be as noticeable. But he is also wrong about the application process...this which is shown is correct...laying down the dry cloth...allowing it to be positioned...then wetting it out...finally...if this IS epoxy resin...it will break down in sunlight, and should be painted, or have pigment added to it. Fiberglass resin will NOT break down in sunlight, which is why surfboards are clear...the graphics are applied to the foam before its glassed. Epoxy boards are always painted, and you will never see the cloth...the graphics are always on the surface.
Another eggspert what doesn't know what he's talking about. You don't need to "always paint epoxy". Look at cedar strip canoes for example. Varnish with UV inhibitors will do a fine job without paint.
First, there is usually more the one way to do something. If your way works for you that's great! While I do have a scale in my shop, I have found it easier to measure out volumes, mark the side of the pot and pour the resin and hardener in to fit the marks. For larger volumes going by weight might be more manageable, but for these little pours I find simple volume pours easier.
Second - I very much agree that sunlight is harsh on the finished surface. While paint would certainly work if that's what you want to look at, I want to see the wood underneath. In lieu of paint, I like a varnish with UV inhibitors added. My choice is Pettit's Z Spar 1015 Captain's varnish. There are other brands out there, to each their own, but for sure a cured epoxy/fiberglass surface needs to have something over it to protect it from UV damage.
Finally, I think woodworking is an experiential thing. The more you do, the better you get. It's near impossible to get the first try correct, but it can certainly inform and improve the second try!
happy paddling!
Jeff
Too much talk...not enough action!!
It's not very kinetic, you're right