Segmented Finish Question

[Gerold Griffin]

I made a planter for my wife and tried to use fiberglass resin and hardner for the finish. No matter how much harder I use it never really dries, just gets tacky. The local folks tell me that it is due to high humidity. Does anyone know of a good waterproof finish that I could use? I kinda have the frame of mind that if it works it works and if not I get more practice but the wife likes this one and would like to salvage it if at all possible. Also, I used Titebond 3 which is supposed to be waterproof. Any thoughts or ideas would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

[Doug Reesor]

Any chance of a picture to give us some idea about the shape you are trying to fill? You look up "Understanding Wood Finishing" by Bob Flexner.

Perhaps you could make a mold for a liner and then make the liner externally, cut it and insert it in the bowl, reglue the pieces together and then put more fiberglass over the inside to truely seal it.

Just some thoughts. I really have never tried this one.

Doug

[David Christopher]

I made a planter for my wife and tried to use fiberglass resin and hardner for the finish. No matter how much harder I use it never really dries, just gets tacky. The local folks tell me that it is due to high humidity. Does anyone know of a good waterproof finish that I could use? I kinda have the frame of mind that if it works it works and if not I get more practice but the wife likes this one and would like to salvage it if at all possible. Also, I used Titebond 3 which is supposed to be waterproof. Any thoughts or ideas would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

If your resin wont dry, its not the wood its the resin ( prolly to old ) that stuff will harden under water

[Gerold Griffin]

Thanks for the response but I think I finally got it worked out. No matter how much hardener I put in the resin it never got hard, just tacky. I tried to buff it with an old shop towel to generate heat and harden it, didn't work. Tried a heatlamp, that to failed. Tried more hardner stayed tacky. Finally found a piece on the net and tried that, it worked. Turned up the rpms and buffed with a piece of wax paper. Guess the heat build up transfered the wax from the paper to the planter and its hard now. Hopefully next weekend I can get it off the face plate and do the bottom.
Thanks

[Jason Hallowell]

Glad you were able to fix it. Just for future reference, with those types of epoxies, the ratio of resin to hardener has to be pretty exact. Using more hardener won't neccesarily make it cure harder or faster, but rather creates an incomplete chemical reaction, often resulting in a tacky uncured finish, just like would happen if you use too little hardener. I've found that using a postal scale to measure by weight is the most precise way to mix it up.