: So I thought, "Should I just re-glass the whole
: thing?"

Listen to that little voice in your head that is saying "NO !!!"

Unless you want to spent the time and considerable dollars to reglass your boat each and every year, don't go down this road. After 6 dozen plus days of use the boat is entitled to display a few "war wounds". These are marks of honor which show you are an adventuresome person who actually uses this boat. If your one patch has a "halo" it is because the boat is angelic.

If this is the end of the paddling season for you, finish fairing and varnishing tha patch and store your boat until spring. Then take it out and bash around in it, playing freely without fear of damaging it. The boat has proven it is tough and that it can take the wear.

Continue this process for at least three more years. In the fifth year, take a good look at the boat and see if you can tell where that first patch was put on. By then you should have several newer areas of patches that attract you eye far more easily.

When the boat starts to look like a worn out quilt, then you can go ahead with stripping off all the outside glass, sanding the wood down to an even color, and recovering the entire exterior. The interior probably won't need it for another 5 years or more.

Here is why I'm suggesting this: The sanding process is going to thin your boat a bit. Do this each year and after 5 years your 1/4 inch strips may be less than 3/16 thick.

The sanding process also kicks up a lot of nasty little (nearly microscopic) glass fiber pieces, which have a way of getting into your lungs. Your body does not like these things and will react in a negative manner. When you applied the glass cloth you did a lot of sanding. This will be much more. You are not just removing a few bumps, you are going to turn about 5 yards of glass fabric into powder. That is a LOT of powdered glass and plastic blowing around.

Finally, there is the cost factor. Epoxy resin is not that cheap. Use it once to build a boat and you cna jsutify the cost. Use it each year to rebuilt a good boat and you get to the point where, after three years it would have been cheaper, and taken just as much time, to build a second boat.

Hey, now there is an idea. Build another boat that is prettier that the first one. Bash around in the old one and keep the new one on display. Or, if you decide to use the new one, build a third boat . . .

Umm, did anyone say this could get addictive?

When you do decide to remove the glas and resin, try any and all alternatives to sanding. Sure, you'll have to clean up a lot of areas by sanding, but if you cna physically tear off sections of intact glass cloth you'll have a safer time. Solvents to soften the resin are one possibility. A couple of other ideas have surfaced, too. The resin does soften when it gets warm. If you use a heat gun carefully you should be able to soften the resin enough so you can work a stiff putty knife between the cloth and the wood.

I've got an idea about using steam, too. We know that water trapped under the glass will delaminate areas when the boat is left in the hot sun. I've seen a home cleaning appliance that generates steam for cleaning. Something like this, or maybe a clothes iron set to generate steam, could soften the resin at a temperature that wouldn't damage the wood. The steam is probably somewhere around 300 degrees, and would cover a sizeable area, while a heat gun would get up well over 700 degrees (wood scorches about 450 degrees). (These are Fahrenheit degrees, not celsius) if you could get a section started and blasst steam between the cloth and the wood it might loosen the cloth so you could peel it away.

Just a few thoughts

PGJ