Got hot coat.

Finally some nice weather again.  That gave me a chance to hot coat.

I used the Solarez for this.  It worked out well and I'm happy with the outcome.  This one is almost done.

Fins get glassed.

I got some beautiful fins from my friend Lance Carstens out of Gresham, OR.  The colors seem to fit with the balsa and cedar on the board.

I plan to hot coat and gloss coat in the next week or so.

Fast glass

It's a nice sunny day here.  Perfect for glassing.  First I did the bottom.  Once it was in the sun it only took 3 minutes to set.

The laps got sanded.  I installed the vent port and leash plug. 

Then I glassed the top.

The bottom and top took about 1 hour to laminate.  That's much faster than epoxy which takes about 2 days.  Just saying.

First seal coat.

The first seal coat is on.  Solarez is easy to work with and drys fast.  This board is going to take a couple coats. 

Closed up and ready to seal.

The top is closed up. It's time to protect the balsa with a seal coat.

 
For this I'm going to use Solarez before glassing.  There are a couple reasons that I'm using polyester on this one instead of epoxy.  I like the fact that the resin hardens from UV.  That means minimal waiting for curing.  The other reason is I hope this board has a little flex.  All my epoxy boards are very stiff which is alright sometimes, but sometimes it's nice to have a little flex.  I'm using Sun Cure for the laminating resin.

Seal balsa with Solarez.

Now I just have to wait for a sunny day.

Shaping up

I have been busy with a few remodeling projects on the house, so I haven't worked on the board for awhile.  Shaping the rails is always a challenge I look forward to.  The first pass on the top is done.

It still needs a lot more work, but it's getting there.

Now the rails are shaped.

Funfish coming together.

There are a couple things I really like about balsa wood.  It's light and it's easy to work.  For a long time I was afraid to use it.  Mostly because I didn't think it was strong enough.  Now I'm feeling pretty good about it's strength.

I sanded the top and bottom panels.  It still needs rail strips and the middle needs to be closed up.

The board feels light and strong.  It's straight and it hasn't lost any rocker.

My next step is to add the balsa rail strips.  That won't add much weight.  It feels like this board will be less or about the same as the foam one.  That makes me excited.