: no doubt abt that. i did stain and seal even before their cutout though but
: this is not new ground or even qualify for. seemed so simple to just lay
: out the whole sheet and go at it and the wastage was low enough that i was
: not too concerned. and also as i did/do not quite know how much panel
: breakage and wastage i would/will get, i wanted to have a certain amount
: of excess to cover. as well as modifications (hehe).

: the main issue i was worried about was whether or not the presealing would
: affect the bending characteristics of the plywood or whether the
: stain/sealing would be colour/surface affected by heatgun or water/steam
: while heatbending.

: as the sealcoat was/is so thin, i have not noticed any less bending
: characteristics from unsealed tho logically should be affected somewhat.
: and have happily not noticed any discolouration so far, but who knows what
: will happen when all finished out?

: will be part of the track record at least if it shows.

The epoxy seal coat does glue the surface ply fibers together making it much stronger than bare wood. You will be able to do harder bends with coated wood. It will require more force to do so. Play with some coated and uncoated scraps and it is very appearent.

The real concern is getting adequate bond with then next coat of epoxy over the seal coat. Sanding is recommended to create a mechanical bond to cured epoxy. I found that scraping a seal coat with a cabinet scraper does a good job removing the hard fuzz and epoxy with out cutting in to the wood just watch the color of the shavings, white = epoxy and brown = wood.