: I have been following this bulletin board for nearly a year and have gotten a
: lot of help. I started a guillemot single earlier this year and have just
: finished all of the wood work. I have read several discussions about
: epoxy, but have not gotten an idea of the best brand to use. I would like
: to hear some comments on preferred brands.

I used West System on my first canoe and Raka on 4 kayaks and 1 canoe. Personally, I don't have any reasons to spend the extra money on West or their additives. Notice my only complaint is price. I didn't have any functional complaints. I know that there was some discussion of West being harder than Raka. My experience seems to subjectively support this. The hull of my first canoe appears to have slightly fewer scratches than the kayaks with Raka even though the canoe has seen far more use. Neither has scratches into the fiberglass. The difference in hardness IMO is so slight that the extra price of West is not justified to me. I don't have any complaints with Raka, but on the last kayak, I was running low of Raka so I placed an order with US Composites. A gallon and 1/2 kit, including shipping, was $60. The color and smell appears to match Raka. Subjectively, the US Composite epoxy seems a little thinner and has a longer working time. I haven't wet out any fiberglass with the US Composites epoxy, but I don't have any reason to suspect that there will be any problems. I've only used it for bonding applications so far. If my observations of being thinner and having a longer working time are correct, the US Composite epoxy may be easier for beginners to use. I can't remember any post on this board where someone did not like the epoxy they were currently using. The only reason I have experimented with different brands has been cost savings.

Kurt