By Michael Huffman
A couple of years ago, I noticed that the bottom member of the double-hung window in my office dormer had begun to rot.
Knowing it would be difficult to buy a matching replacement, I decided to repair the window using WEST SYSTEM® Epoxy and fiberglass. Continue reading
By Jeff Wright – GBI VP of Technical Services
At Gougeon Brothers, Inc. we are always measuring the ultimate strength of our epoxy products, their adhesive strength, and the strength of the resulting composite laminates (The values measured are often impressive, and the numbers for real-world applications may seem unbelievable). For example, the tensile strength on our Technical Datasheet (TDS) for 105 Epoxy Resin® and 205 Fast Hardener® is 7,900 psi. This means I could easily hang my Chevrolet® Silverado with a full payload using a 1″ x 1″ casting of epoxy! This is true in a perfect application, but our common sense tells us that it is risky. That common sense may be because we understand the need for a safety factor (Sf) in our calculations. Continue reading
By Jenessa Hilger – GBI Marketing
The weekend before our wedding, my husband and I bought our S2 7.9 meter sailboat. She was exactly what we were looking for, a trailerable racer/cruiser that was a diamond in the rough. Over the past nine years, we’ve made many improvements, the latest of which was building a custom fiberglass and carbon fiber rudder support, or as I nicknamed it, a rudder hook. Read on to see how (and why) we made it.
Lisa Blair sailed her 15.25-meter Hick 50 into the record books this year as the fastest, non-stop, solo sailor to circumnavigate Antarctica. The wild, demanding nature of the Southern Ocean required Lisa Blair to ensure her vessel was in the best possible condition before undertaking her voyage. Equally important was provisioning the proper materials and spare parts to cover every kind of repair job on her epic voyage.
If your swim platform is experiencing water penetration, a repair or even a rebuild could be in your near future. We’ll show you how to measure the damage, and perform a successful repair that will last for years to come.
Before starting on your next fiberglass repair or boat modification, let’s look at some projects that would most-likely require you to make appropriate structural reinforcements to your boat. After all – boats are complicated structures. Sailboats endure multiple loads from the rigging as the shrouds are pulled in tension and the mast is compressed into the hull. Inboard-powered boats must transfer the thrust from the engine mounts into the stringers while outboard and sterndrive boats place substantial loads on the transom. Even the steering wheel at a stand-up helm can undergo high loads when the boat moves fast through large waves — the security of which many go-fast boaters may take for granted. Let’s dive in.