Letter 35021

Glass Fibre Canoe Refinishing [UK] 

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Hi,
I'm a Scout Leader in London. We have quite a few Glass Fibre Canoes with terrible finishes due to the fact that they have been used quite a bit, and have lasted quite some time. Obviously we'd love some new ones but we can't afford to buy any. Is there any way of refinishing the Canoe and what are the processes and materials involved?
Cheers,

Arun Koshal
Scouts - London, UK

Arun,

Gor Blimey ... ain't you got lottsa vendors of fibreglass in ole London, eh? Why don't you try them first of all instead of hoping for a low cost cure from abroad.

Get some resin from one of these ... with colouring, if poss... find out from them the amount of the curing agent,
ie. catalyst to be used.

If the canoe bottoms are badly scraped, take some photos down to one of these guys and ask if it's a good idea to ALSO use some fibreglass matt, cloth etc to build it up.

And if you want to paint the entire canoe ... or just the
hull ... consider using the (expensive) 2 component
urethane as it's scratch resistance is far, far better than any polyester or vinylester resin.

Freeman Newton
- White Rock, B.C. Canada

I want to answer or follow-up on this subject publicly (in non-commercial fashion).

 

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