Hello fellow tri-builders, I am back from extended summer travels, and a little bit of laziness! Sorry for the long pause between posts. We actually did get the "ski-slope" foam fillets installed last spring, and then glassed over the entire interior. This was a somewhat frustrating job due to the tight space and small areas the glass had to be worked into. I tried doing it as a large single piece of glass in the mostly straight section, but I had to split the piece up midway through. Lesson learned! Unfortunately I was too tired by the time I finished to try to add peel-ply, so when I finally got back to work over the past couple of weeks, I had to sand the interior. Again, this was frustrating and kinda slow due to the tight spaces that had to be sanded in the beam. Peel-ply is definitely a gift from the FRP gods!
In these photos you can see the result of today's effort. I added a second layer of glass along the sides onto the bottom of the beam interior. I did divide the glass into overlapping sections this time, and it went pretty smoothly. I also made sure to add peel-ply, which took some time, but was definitely worth it in time savings later. I laid the beam on its side to apply the glass around the bottom, side, and fillets more easily, then flipped it over to do the other side. Rather than rushing and causing myself more headaches, I chose to let one side set for an hour before flipping the form to glass the other side. I was worried gravity would work against me and cause the glass to droop if I flipped it too soon. Worked well, gave me a chance to eat lunch. Here both sides are done and have already set so I could set the beam right-side up.
Next up - more inside reinforcing ...
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