[flyingfrizzle]

Now that the old wood was removed and the fiberglass tabbing was ground down we are ready to prep the core to re-install. The owner decided to go back with marine grade ply as the composites are just so high. I am taking two 3/4" plys and bonding them together with epoxy and if sealed up 100% it should last 30 plus years. I use the us composites 635 thin resin normally as it is thin enough the wood with absorb the resin and the glass wets out much faster with it. I mark the wood plys by tracing around the back of the hull and then ruff cut them to shape. For in between the cores I am using something new this time to help the wood absorb up more resin. I have found that the more resin the wood has absorbed and the better it is sealed the longer it survives. The material I am using is a fine felt with long strand fibers on each side. Its kinda like csm but with no binders in it and the fibers are more spread apart and longer. The felt helps hold resin between the plys so that when the dry wood soaks it in there is plenty to pull from. I have seen where the wood draws so much resin out of csm it left the cloth between it dry. Polyester or ve resin will cure fast and it dose not have as much time to soak in as the epoxy. I am using a slow cure that takes 24 hours to fully cure when spread thin so it will have plenty of soak time. I also pre wet the plys first just to give them a head start soaking in resin. Once I get the felt/glass wetted on one ply I roll all the air bubbles out and carefully put the other piece on top. Once it is lined up I screw the two pieces together so that it forces the plys tight and forces pressure on the resin to help push it into the wood. I take any resin that pushes out the sides and spread it on the ends of the ply to help seal them up as the end grain is where most of the water soaks in from. Once the resin set up I pulled the screws out and then cut a piece of 1708 to lay up on the face of the core. It is easier to lay it up and roll out while flat vs in the boat. The next layers will be done in the boat as I like to tab to the sides with one full piece with out seams. The screw holes left will allow resin to draw down to the other side of the ply so when flipped over and the back side done it will lock the two sides together with epoxy binding threw the pulled out screw passages. One other thing I have learned to do is cut the edges of the core on angles. With the transom on a 13 degree angle, if you cut the edges on 30 degrees you will have a tighter fit and the roll in the back corner will not hold the core from sitting all the way down. I also cut the top edge on a 45 degree angle then round it with the grinders sanding pad so the cloth will follow the edge all the way to the top and keep you from having to try and fold it around a had 90 degree edge.

Core cut to shape:



Core soaked with thin resin:





Core bonded together:





Core screwed together:



1708 cloth cut to size:



1708 cloth glassed down:



Radius cut on the top edge:





Hours: 8

Total Hours: 43