Fiberglassing the Hull

[FHB02]

Hi bear mountain builders

First of all im Sorry if this topic has been up before, I find it somewhat hard to navigate through old topics and finding answers on my very specific questions.
My first canoe is now ready for fiberglass epoxy seal. I am completely new to epoxy, fiberglass and building canoes for that matter. I am planning on using West system 105/207, but my questions is regarding the fiberglass.

I have been looking for a twill woven fibeglass fabric, but it seems somewhat impossible to buy a twill woven 160gsm 1,5m broad fiberglass fabric in europe. I have found a fabric from fyne boat kits thats 200gsm, but I dont know if thats to heavy? Or it will give me problems with the epoxy not wetting out the fabric? I have just read that its harder to apply.
Otherwise I will have to buy a 1m broad fabric and then make a fiberglass joint down the side of the hull, any experiences with that? How visible will it be? how hard is it? will it weaken my hull a lot?

If anyone know a good and fast supplier in europe I would appreciate that a lot as well
All tips and tricks will also be warmly received

Kind regards
Frederik

[Stephen]

Hello Frederik

I imagine this is the fabric you are looking at. https://www.fyneboatkits.co.uk/supplie ... ss-fabric/

200 gsm twill, 1.55 m wide

This corresponds to 6 oz cloth 61" wide. https://www.wolframalpha.com/input?i=2 ... 2Fyard%5E2 This is certainly a weight and width that is widely used by builders in North America. It's about the same as what Bear Mountain Boats sells in their store.

Stephen

[FHB02]

Hello Stephen

I just want to let you know that today I finished my first canoe (Bobs special 15'). I really appreciated your kind answers in here, when everything seemed unmanageable.
Building a woodstrip canoe was a dream of my dads and last year when I found the bead and cove router bits he bought 17 years ago, I got the urge to built one as well.
The canoe is not perfect, but I am satisfied with the result considering its the first one I have built.
I tried to attach two images through the link below.
kind regrads
Frederik

https://wetransfer.com/downloads/15f849 ... 103/18612e

[Stephen]

Congratulations Frederik

I'm glad to hear that things went well. European builders always seem to have difficulty getting fiberglass in a width suitable for canoe building.

I am sure the canoe looks wonderful, but unfortunately when I tried to download the pictures I got an error message along the lines of "unsupported file type/ corrupted file". Surely you would think that jpeg is a supported file type.

Stephen

[FHB02]

Hi Stephen

Yeah it wasn’t too easy buying materials in Europe but I managed to find everything. I must admit that building this canoe was indeed very satisfying and I am pretty sure, that I can’t help it, but building one more. Maybe the endeavour kayak.

I did make a post on instagram though, maybe this link will work:
https://www.instagram.com/p/Cy0KT5AttBC/?img_index=3

Frederik

[Patricks Dad]

Your instagram link worked. Beautiful canoe! Yeah, you can't just build one...

best regards.