tj309

Hello - I am embarking on a semi-major boat project and would like to know who supplies fiberglass matt, cloth and resin at a price better than the usual marine shops. I need medium quantities of the above products. Excellent forum and thanks in advance.

TJ

tommymonza

Where are you located

Gmoney52

We used to be able to buy at cost as an employee. Don't you have a buddy that works at a glass using facility?G$

tj309

I am located in Southern AL and I wish I did have a freind in the business. TJ

glassdave

one big problem with buying outside of your area is shipping resins. the HASMAT kills any savings you will get through any of the online places. i usually buy my dry stuff from either fiberglast.com or uscomposites.com and get my wet stuff from a place called eastpointe fiberglass about an hour from me. its worth the drive to save on the shipping when i get large quantities. how much and what kind of product do you need?




G . . . .quit fart'in in the fiberglass section ya thread killer

tj309

Hello GlassDave - I didnt think I would get the expert on this! I need about 150 square feet of matt and about half that in cloth. And enough resin to handle all of that. Just to be sure lets up that to 200. I am a good woodwoker and am going to cut my boat's cockpit to make it longer and rearrange the gauges and side of the helm. I plan on building the new decking/dash out of 1/2" plywood and glassing both sides with matt. Then the outside will be glassed with cloth and sanded and faired into whats already there. Good plan? And how do I match the white paint (or gelcoat) on my deck so I dont have to repaint the whole boat's topside? You are awesome and thanks.....TJ

glassdave

yes you can build it that way. when using fiberglass over plywood a good rule of thumb is a 50/50 ratio of glass to resin. in a good hand layup you should have one ounce of resin to one ounce of fiberglass. figure out what weight and type of mat/fabric you want to use than you can figure out the amount of resin needed. keep in mind that mat is sold in ounces per sq./ft and fabrics are ounces per sq./yrd. plywood will generally take 3 ounces per sq./ft to wet out for a primer coat befor the first layer goes on. you might also want to pre-fab the panels out of the boat an glass than them in.

somthing to think about if you would like to do it a little more advanced would be to use a NidaCore panel or make up some balsa cored sheets.good luck

tj309

Dave thanks for your reply. I guess the best way to do this is buy the resin locally because of the hazmat BS and get the rest on the net. I do not understand about the plywood "wetting out" part. I am planning to do as much of this project out of the boat as possible to allow the glass to dry horizontally with gravity to minimize my sanding. Then I will plug the new deck in and glass it in. One of the neat things I am doing is designing the dash and gauge arrangement and making it fit the boat. I will have the most awesome dash you have ever seen and hope to get it in the mags. One other question I have is ...how hard is it to fare the new paint into the old? I really dont want to have to paint the whole top of the boat.....

Thanks Dave...TJ