Tear Drop Camper Build 4: Applying the Fiberglass and Epoxy

since last time i have sanded the exterior of the camper i have also created a sort of a chamfer on the edges of it so that the so water will have a chance to go by the edges of the trailer you'll see more of that when i put the camper on but uh i'm ready to start putting on my first coat of epoxy i've looked at many different ways of putting on epoxy for things like this and because this is bare wood and it's basically construction grade plywood it's best to put at least one coat of epoxy on there before i put on the fiberglass i already completed the hatch and i learned a lot in doing that i had previously only used fiberglass in this method one other time when i created a wood kayak and um what i learned in both those processes both the kayak and with the hash that i just did this this last week is the amount of epoxy you put on is really important you don't want to put on gobs and gobs of it you want to put on a thin layer at a time so i'll be explaining more about that as i go through i am not an expert at this i have done a lot of research read a lot watched a lot of videos and so hopefully i am doing this correctly if you have any comments about things i could have done differently or better please leave them below otherwise i'm going to get to it i mentioned my last video that i had this epoxy mas epoxies or moss epoxies i got a really good deal on it sporting history was going out of business and i got this for i think it was 90 off so i had to get it so anyway that's what i'm using it's a 2-1 epoxy and they have these nice pumps in here so use those and then i need to stir it for two minutes [Applause] pour the epoxy in this small tray we've got a foam roller on it i think it's a six inch and uh this works really nice for getting it on a nice even thin layer [Applause] [Applause] well i didn't like how those pumps were working i couldn't tell if it was actually accurate or not so i'm going to go with this it's actually a little quicker to do a couple batches here this this has gradations on the side i can just follow those still don't want to make up too much at one time [Applause] i suppose i should have done the top first make it easier when i tried to reach over to get that oh well so it's the next day i have put on a second coat i got up early this morning and put a second coat on because the plywood did suck up a lot of it um and so now i've got a nice layer of epoxy on there i've sanded it and now i'm going to put on the fiberglass cloth and then i'll put epoxy on over that so i have this long roll of epoxy cloth and i'm going to go around the sides first so this side around the back and around the other side first and then the then i'll do a piece of cloth over the top this cloth is 50 inches wide that's the distance from this edge to that edge so i'm not going to overlap the cloth because i'm going to end up putting some trim on here that i'm going to end up epoxying on and that should seal up these corners which is where water can get in so let's get started do by myself but i think i can manage i've got a clamp up here i'm going to try and clamp a board to hold this up making sure i got enough hang over this i'm just chasing out all the areas where it's kind of billows out i started on the opposite side and just running it around i'll do this a couple times in case i need to reposition this but i want this as flat as possible against the side before i apply epoxy my goal is in each of these spots is to start in the center and then work my way out try and prevent some of those air bubbles underneath the cloth the cloth does a couple of things it helps to add strength to the overall structure because it has the fiberglass running in two directions and then the other thing it does is help to provide a uniform thickness for this layer and of course we're waterproofing as we do this as well the fiberglass also helps to prevent the epoxy from cracking over time as well so so i've been having to chase this uh kind of loose part as i go around i kind of figured that would happen but it hasn't been too bad and uh i had don't think i have too many air bobbles in the fiberglass so that's a good thing that's an easy thing to have happen when you're doing this on the kayak i did i had lots of air bubbles as i didn't know what i was doing i know a little bit more now this is also the third foam roller i've been putting on it's an exothermic reaction on this epoxy and because there's so much that gets built up into this foam roller after a while it uh it starts to cure actually and it got really hard really hot too so i had to take it off twice hopefully this one will finish the rest of the job so it's the next morning and uh i had come out last night late i think it was about midnight when the epoxy was just starting to set up and i trimmed off the extra fiberglass cloth i forgot to film that it was well past my bedtime so anyway so i've got the sides with the fiberglass on still have to sand that and then put a final coat on there but i'm going to do the top and front now here's an example of this uh roller on one side it's getting really hot and hard and i'm really having a difficult time getting the epoxy into the cloth so i've got to take this one off and put on a fresh one so it's several hours later and uh this is uh a little tacky it's uh not a hundred percent um cured yet and that's the stage where you want to cut off this extra so i just take a razor blade you can cut it really easy here if you wait till it completely cures this will be much more difficult i'm going to go ahead and sand with 120 on all the sides and the top just to knock off any high spots that may have formed and that'll get me ready to um do it hopefully one more coat of epoxy just one more and but we'll see how that finishes up oh oh i don't like wearing that thing but you need it especially with uh this uh epoxy dust you don't want that breathing down into your lungs you don't want a wood dust either but i think the epoxy dust is probably worse for you so now i'm going to wipe it all off with some mineral spirits and then i can apply another coat over the whole thing of epoxy i know this is kind of hard to see but uh after i apply the coat on here i take a dry brush or roller i should say and i go over it and that helps pick up any extra epoxy that might possibly run gives it a nice smoother finish that way so i've got this coat on of course i'll let it dry and then i'm going to let it cure for a couple days and then i'll be able to get into the sand and then i'll be able to get into the painting process i'll have to sand it a little bit before that just to uh make the paint accept it a little bit but right now it looks pretty good i'm gonna go back around it after about half an hour here just make sure there's no drips or runs um but uh i think i've got a nice smooth coat on and it's looking good thanks for watching i appreciate the support so you

Channel: Mark Hanson

Views: 68,976

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Id: CakM0RH-RkU

Length: 14min 57sec (897 seconds)

Published: Sun Aug 09 2020