MegaSack DRAW - This year's winner is user - rgwb
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I need to make a very minor repair to a shower cubicle in one of our caravans. I've used the fibreglass matting and the resin to harden it off which works brilliantly but it looks shocking. Part of this is down to my cack handedness, but is there anything I can use for a better finish?
sand it
I thought about that but the colour is heinous too, is it paintable?
If the shower is white you could use Gelcoat filler which you can use to fill small-ish holes/cracks and then sand/polish once cured.
you need some wax gelcoat, also known as flowcoat, ask your local boatbuilder...
The showers are a delightful peachy colour. I'll look into wax gelcoat - thanks.
TS
Try Glasplies:
All you need there.
I assume you've repaired it from the back and not the gel coat (shiny) side?
Hth
Marko
Marko - thanks for that. I can't repair it from the back unfortuantely. Well, not without hacking the caravan to bits!
TS
accept it will be gash and either live with it or buy a new shower tray you wont get a good repair from the front
accept it will be gash and either live with it or buy a new shower tray you wont get a good repair from the front
yes you can - a bit involved but you can get a perfect repair from the outside if you want. If yo uwant to know how I'll find the method I used on one of my boats.
sharkbait - I'm interested in that if you have the detail.
TS: here [url= http://www.sail.ie/laser_fix/laser_hull_hole.htm ]you go[/url] (not the one I used but the same method).
If you need to create a curved backing piece you simply put some masking/packing tape into the fibreglass next the the hole (so it has the same curvature) and lay up two layers of mat onto the tape. Once it's cured it will just pull off the tape and you can trim it to size.
And you can get white epoxy kits from surf shops, marine chandlers and the like.
yeah, those don't really give you a nice smooth finish though - generally used as an emergency repair so you can get back on the board quickly. Much depends on the repair being done, if it's not structural I'd simply fill it with gelcoat filler.
Yes, the "Doctor Ding" stuff is for quick repairs (roll it like putty and stick it on) but you can get proper 2-pack epoxy in white.
The problems with the blind backer idea are that a boat hull has no point loads in normal use, so the patch gets very little pressure on it, a 5mm overlap and a bit of epoxy is fine to hold it and support all the load it'll ever see. However the shower base may well need much more strength (100kg person standing on the patch with a heel?) so I'm not convinced it'd hold. If it were an own-caravan and you just were fixing it for your family it might be worth the risk but when you can't control who's stepping in, how rough then are or what they weigh...
You'll struggle to repair it to original strength, but the blind backer is about the only method you can use (that I can think of) without back end access.
That said, and on reading back, if it's a minor repair it may not cause too much hassle!