Laser Hull

How do I put a fiberglass boat back together?

I have a laser that’s broken into two pieces, a deck and a hull. Is epoxy the best way to get the two pieces together?

I wouldn’t faff about with epoxy on what sounds like a relatively simple and straightforward task of re-bonding your deck moulding to the hull.

A right palaver for such a simple task! And even if in a workshop which is all set up for epoxy work it’s debatable whether this would be an appropriate repair material. Though if done properly, certainly not inappropriate: there would be nothing wrong with it, of course.

I suggest you get an appropriate quantity (one or two tubes) of a proprietary brand polyurethane adhesive sealant such as Sikaflex™ of an appropriate colour, a frame-gun, masking tape, clean rags and a bottle of white spirit.

Thoroughly clean and degrease the gelcoat in the areas you need to fix – or even all around the entire sheerline for a really thorough job – and remove all traces of any old bonding material, run a neat line of tape around just at or below the overlap, on the hull, abrade the area to which you intend to apply the sealant (then lightly degrease again, using a clean cloth with a small amount of white spirit on it) and apply a deep ‘fillet’* between the two mouldings using the nozzle supplied with the tube and some careful tooling and / or your fingertip inside a rubber glove, dipped in some of the white spirit.

Keep things clean with the white spirit, but try to keep things as ‘surgically’ clean as you can manage as these sealants are extremely messy. (As are epoxies, too!)

Take care to ‘tool’ the sealant (draw it out to a neat surface or finish) fairly soon after application as these ‘skin’ over quickly.

If you are good at using a frame-gun there will be little if any need for this as it is perfectly possible to obtain a neat fillet straight from the nozzle. (It would look a bit like a weld, and quite acceptable as it will be under the overlap).

I strongly recommend that you unstep the mast and invert the boat for carrying out the entire task. Set it up on low trestles for much better access. Remove the masking tape as soon as you have applied the sealant to the entire job: As soon as you are done, while it is still wet.

A morning’s work.
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* (Fillet: a concave strip of material roughly triangular in cross section that rounds off an interior angle between two surfaces).

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