Cabin Table Upgrade - Practice
- Need to mix the resin for longer to ensure the cure is complete. After 1 and 1/2 hours, the resin was still not 'solid', firm enough that I could not pull the mixing spatulas out of the cups, but maybe it will take much longer to fully cure. I'll wait 24 hours.
- Using my gloved fingers to eradicate the solid colors works, but need to make sure that it's not confined to a very small area as it shows in the finished product.
Here's a view of the 1st test piece after 26 hours of cure time.
- The test piece was just an offcut of a ply wood, no sanding or rounding of the edges. However, the resin did not flow over the sides as expected, I'll round the edges of the next test piece.
- The 'cells' formed quite nicely and the 'waves' were pretty effective for a 1st try.
For the 2nd test piece, I'll round over the top edges and apply a couple of coats of primer similar to that applied to the actual tabletop.
Lessons learned:- Baby powder is great to ease putting on the vinyl gloves. Dust was not much of an issue but it's worth it to build a dust covered bench. The coloring pigments go a long way! I barely used 1/4 of a teaspoon and the resulting resin mix had a vibrant coloring. Making the sandy color using the copper and tiny amount of the black pigments worked our really well. If I want the underside of the table sealed, it should be done prior to the top application of resin.
Ok, time to make the second test piece.
See you on the water, getting closer to having a new cabin table.
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