Anyone Use a Sprayer for Fiberglass Resin?

[cprince]

I just saw an episode of Dirty Jobs with Mike Rowe. They were making forms for concrete reef balls. When they made the fiberglass form, they used a compressed air sprayer.

Is this useful? Can you use a standard paint sprayer?

The other thing that they had was a fiberglass material shredder/shooter type thing. It was quite neat. The unit was fed what looked like a 3 or 4 inch wide strip of fiberglass and it went into a shredder of some kind and they aimed the gun wherever they wanted the chop to go to.

That was neat!

 

[redfury]

Re: Anyone Use a Sprayer for Fiberglass Resin?

They are pretty cool, I've seen them on TV too and thought it would be a lot easier to do that than wetting out sheets of CSM/cloth. You won't be using it in your own garage though, unless you can justify the cost of the thing.

 

[jameskb2]

Re: Anyone Use a Sprayer for Fiberglass Resin?

It's called a chopper gun, and I have seen that episode. The rig they are using is a pro gun and they are not cheap.

You can buy lesser expensive types, I've looked into it. The basic cheapie is about $400 (a little less) for the gun. A roll of strand to run through it (50 lbs) is about $180. Then you will need a cup gun, (or dump gun) to shoot your resin. This is a post mix model, for gel coat or resin. $170. To buy a "real" shop type rig, for production, is $4,000 and up. Depending on if you want the "craftsman" model or the "Snap On". Not the real names there, just a comparison to quality / price you might be familiar with.

 

[cprince]

Re: Anyone Use a Sprayer for Fiberglass Resin?

Oh well.... there goes the idea of using my cheap-o Power Fist model paint sprayer!



They sure are neat to look at though!

 

[RyanSS]

Re: Anyone Use a Sprayer for Fiberglass Resin?

It will also produce a result that is not near as strong as "unchopped" fiberglass. Perfect for the underside of a hot tub or bath tub or even a non-planing hull, but not a very good idea for a power boat.

 

[RyanSS]

Re: Anyone Use a Sprayer for Fiberglass Resin?

Clarification: I'm referring to using a the chopped fiber gun as a bad idea for a boat If just using it to spray resin, i don't see any problem with that.

 

[oops!]

Re: Anyone Use a Sprayer for Fiberglass Resin?

most boats are built with chopper guns.......there are few that are hand laid from start to finish.

the use of a chopper gun is an art......(just about all aspects af glassing are an art) it is not a simple thing as catylist-resin ratios must be exact for the temp and humidity. after that, they try to get a 40% resin to 60 percent chop ratio.....then they try to lay it evenly over the mold....

in production boat building, a guy on a chopper gun can save you huge money or cost you a ton.