Bonding the decks to the hulls

For our last class before the holidays, we set out to bond the wood strip decks to the hulls of our SUPs.

The glass cloth had fully cured.  The prep work involved trimming the excess glass cloth with a razor knife.  We then gave the glass edge a light sanding to remove any sharp edges.

Once the deck panel was to this stage, we screwed in the access port ring.  This was fastened with 6 stainless screws and bedded in a small bead of 3M 5200.

The decks were then flipped so we could epoxy in the leash cups / tie downs.

We epoxied the mating surfaces and dropped them in making sure the cross bars in the cups aligned with the wood strips.

Next up was masking off the hull so we wouldn't make a mess with the 5200.

We applied a continuous bead around the perimeter of the hull and along the length of the 5 stringers.

Then, as a team, we carefully set the decks straight down into position and added weights, lots of blue tape and a trucker's strap in one area.

The 3M 5200 is the toughest bonding agent around.  The students signed and dated their hulls on the inside before we closed them up.  Hopefully they will never see their signatures again!

Here some photos: