glassing floats
 

I have a pair of balsa covered foam floats I want to glass. Can anybody give me a few pointers on where to start? About the only thing I've glassed before are wing center sections. What weight cloth should I use and which resin is best? Thanks, Matt.

RE: glassing floats
 

I like to use 3/4 oz. cloth and Zap Z-Poxy finishing resin thinned 50% with methal hydrate. (Used to make windshield washer fluid), available at your local hardware store. Then either fill the weave with another coat of epoxy, not thinned so much, or a few coats of Polycrylic filler.
Hope this is helpful.
Bill

RE: glassing floats
 

I have 3 sets of Niagara foam core floats and they recommend using water based polyurethane varnish. Get the indoor variety at Lowe's or Home Depot. The exterior doesn't work well, for some reason. As I said, I have 3 sets, all done this way and it's cheap and works well.

RE: glassing floats
 

Ed, are you saying to use the poly instead of epoxy? What weight cloth did you use? Matt

RE: glassing floats
 

I'll second the polyurethane trick that Ed shared. Where I had trouble was placing the cloth on the plane and keeping it in place. I thought I was clever and sprayed a light dusting of 3m77 spray adhesive on the float. Then I smoothed the cloth in place. Then I brushed on the polyurethane. BUT I used solvent-based PU and not Water-based. The solvent dissolved the 3m77, and the cloth bubbled at the corners.
Still, once it was done, it was strong and light, and easier to work with than sticky epoxy that is racing toward the end of its pot-life.

RE: glassing floats
 

Here are the instructions for glassing the floats given on the Niagara web site.

The covering instructions with water based polyurethane varnish are at the end.

[link=http://www.foamcorefloats.com/images/Building%20Instructions.pdf]Niagara Foam Core Floats[/link]