Olifin
I have finished the lay up of about 25 yards of Olifin fabric on the first
section of the Wyoming. A couple thoughts I have about Olifin.
1. ALWAYS coat the plywood first and allow it to get real tacky before
rolling on the cloth. Olifin will roll on easy and is easy to pull the
wrinkles out without stretching the cloth out of shape. Olifin floats
easily in epoxy so this way eliminates this possibility. Press it down into
the tacky epoxy with your hand (top of cloth is still dry) or use a wet out
roller. Let it set up before continuing on with filler coats. Don't let it
set more than 24 hours or so between coats so you can still get a chemical
bond.
This method may not work for fiber glass because of the tighter weave.
2. I used straight epoxy and a scraper to lay on the first filler coat. It
almost looked too dry after scrapping but that's okay. The fibers really
soak up this first batch of epoxy.
3. SAND between every coat. The fuzzy fibers will be exaggerated with each
following coat of epoxy. A simple light sanding between coats eliminates a
LOT of hard sanding on the final coat. Trust me, I made this mistake on the
first panel.
The following panels received a light sanding between coats and hardly any
sanding on the final to get a nice finish.
4. To fill the weave, I used micro balloons to slightly thicken the epoxy.
This seemed to work the best when using a scraper to keep it from foaming
up. It made a better finish and it's a lot easier to sand.
5. Olifin lays nice and takes curves and corners a lot better than fiber
glass.
6. This stuff is HARD when set up in epoxy. Amazing stuff really!
7. It's not transparent when saturated in epoxy.
8. Olifin really soaks up epoxy for a 4 Oz. cloth. I would estimate around
1/2 gal per sheet of plywood. I've coated about the equivallent of 9 full
sheets using about 4 gallons of epoxy and I still have a final finishing
coat to apply after assembly and covering the nails.
Jeff
section of the Wyoming. A couple thoughts I have about Olifin.
1. ALWAYS coat the plywood first and allow it to get real tacky before
rolling on the cloth. Olifin will roll on easy and is easy to pull the
wrinkles out without stretching the cloth out of shape. Olifin floats
easily in epoxy so this way eliminates this possibility. Press it down into
the tacky epoxy with your hand (top of cloth is still dry) or use a wet out
roller. Let it set up before continuing on with filler coats. Don't let it
set more than 24 hours or so between coats so you can still get a chemical
bond.
This method may not work for fiber glass because of the tighter weave.
2. I used straight epoxy and a scraper to lay on the first filler coat. It
almost looked too dry after scrapping but that's okay. The fibers really
soak up this first batch of epoxy.
3. SAND between every coat. The fuzzy fibers will be exaggerated with each
following coat of epoxy. A simple light sanding between coats eliminates a
LOT of hard sanding on the final coat. Trust me, I made this mistake on the
first panel.
The following panels received a light sanding between coats and hardly any
sanding on the final to get a nice finish.
4. To fill the weave, I used micro balloons to slightly thicken the epoxy.
This seemed to work the best when using a scraper to keep it from foaming
up. It made a better finish and it's a lot easier to sand.
5. Olifin lays nice and takes curves and corners a lot better than fiber
glass.
6. This stuff is HARD when set up in epoxy. Amazing stuff really!
7. It's not transparent when saturated in epoxy.
8. Olifin really soaks up epoxy for a 4 Oz. cloth. I would estimate around
1/2 gal per sheet of plywood. I've coated about the equivallent of 9 full
sheets using about 4 gallons of epoxy and I still have a final finishing
coat to apply after assembly and covering the nails.
Jeff