Yesterday morning I found my attempt to rebond this piece got messed up.
I was using the weights to clamp the pieces together, roughly a right angle, but a little obtuse. Apparently the weights weren't balanced and were momentarily hanging on by the high viscosity of the Loctite 8X PL, probably tipped over right after I left.
Sanded the hardened adhesive smooth with the belt sander, and did a test strip with 5 minute epoxy, which actually yields a very good bond in the pink foam. Made a trip to Home Depot to get 8 oz of 5 minute epoxy (for $15!), because I can't wait another 24 hours to do this with a less expensive adhesive.
So about 1 hour later I was ready for glass.
The resin that you can buy at Home Depot (polyester I think?) dissolves the pink foam. This information can be found by googling, but I didn't notice it prominently in any of my fiberglass readings. I might have known better on the basis of the smell; the resin smells very strongly of solvent. I went back to 3wheeler's Insight Tail and realized he used epoxy resin, which doesn't share the problem.
This is the result:
As the foam melts, the air bubbles out and it shrinks, in some cases the air pockets weaken the structure. In other cases is merely makes it looks uneven, depending on what order I lay the glass, how long the resin gels in the cup before it gets applied, and whatnot.
Surprisingly, I think it will be okay and I intend to live with it if it doesn't prove me wrong and break.
I've always liked Metro's axiom:
Quote:
Originally Posted by MetroMPG
...You know what they say: the perfect is the enemy of the good. (I'm typically on the other side of the battle from "pefect"  ) |
For the remaining surfaces that will get glass (i.e. the underside), I've coated with a thin layer of the Loctite 3X PL (since I had most of a tube of it leftover) to seal up the foam.
... so at least it will look nice where no one sees.
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In other news, 3dcadbrowser has
finally accepted 2 of my submissions. Much to my surprise, I received no download credit for them. So I hunted through what little info they provide, and realized that I don't get download credits for uploading a model; I get a download credit every time someone else downloads one of the models that I've submitted. I'm sure I'll have this project finished by then.