OK Folks:

After I admired my newly precoated deck long enough - I tried to separate it from the forms.

Unfortunately, the hot melt glue that wouldn't hold the &%$#&ing strips on while I was laying them, is now stronger than the glue between the strips (and even some of the strips themselves). Why I didn't stop, I don't know. It was as if I had been taken over - like the Hulk! In the end there was a big mess. Cracks along the accent strips, cracks in strips. Some as long as three to four feet. I went from being proud papa to demolition man, boo hoo. And finally when the damaged peirced my alter-ego's intensity, we stopped. Never got the deck separated (or it would be in pieces). I walked away for a couple days and drown my sorrows in a flood of tear-tinged scotch.

The cracks almost all go back together without visible seams. I've re-glued and taped them. There are a couple, however that would not go back perfectly. For the ones with gaps, I'll either fill with wood or dookie. For the ones that went together with a ridge, I guess I'll sand and re-coat with epoxy. Will I ever be able to get the sanded areas to look the same? Or am I better off sanding the entire deck back to bare wood and re-coating?

Lessons: I think I should have glassed before trying to remove the deck from the forms. That and stapleless for my first stripper might have been ambitious.

Thanks for this catharsis of this board. I think I'd still be drinking if I didn't have this place to go to. . .

R