Recently, Glen Smith posted that someone (Whitworks) on Bear Mountain Boats Forum had posted a squeegie-less method for removing excess epoxy during the fiberglass wetout step. Whitworks describes a facile technique that presses paper towels into the pooled epoxy with the roller that one has just used for wetting out the glass. I can report that it is fast, easy, inexpensive and creates far less mess than any squeegie-man would have you believe. Certainly, far less mess than that created by attempting to squeegie foamed, excess epoxy, into a paper cup.

I used the blue colored towels, SHOP MAX brand, by Tork. First, wet out the glass with epoxy with a roller as usual. Then, rather than using a squeegie to move all the excess epoxy (you can find) to the edge of the work field (sheerline)... you place overlapping paper towels over the wet glass and go over the towels with the roller you just used for the wetout. Then peal off the towels and throw them in the trash. The inside deck of my Guillemot L took less than half a roll of towels.

Much speculation was made of the mess: Yet no epoxy dripped on the floor and I did not have to change my gloves (other than to take a photograph.) ie. less mess. Is there paper towel waste? Yes, less than half a roll.

Much speculation was made of the lint: HAHAHAHAHAHAHA, OMG this has to be the silliest arguement I have ever seen in virtual print... even a damn fool knows not to use paper towels to SCRUB liquid epoxy off of wet fiberglass fabric. The roller is used to press the liquid into the paper. Plain and simple there is NO lint. Furthermore, when I have used a squeegie (even a very flexible one made from polypro milk bottles) I eventually get a small amount of fiberglass lint here and there from the scraping motion of the squeegie across the glass fibers. ie. LESS lint. Truth be told, the lint thing was the epiphany for a really good idea.

It is much faster: With a roller, I can go across a surface 10 times faster than I can with a squeegie. It took me an hour to get ALL of this done. While I did not weigh things out to make sure I was leaving less weight of epoxy in the final product, my general feeling is that one can remove more excess epoxy, in a more uniform fashion than one can with squeegie technique.

Not yet discussed. A roller handle is much more comfortable to me than holding onto a squeegie. My hand cramps up after a while when using a squeegie. Not a problem with this technique.

Problems created: Hmmm... I don't need nearly as many squeegies. Hence, I will not be drinking as much milk... to get the plastic... to make the squeegies... AND, I have more time on my hands... to drink... single malt... and write up posts. I hope the above was coherent.

Thank you: Glen Smith

THANK YOU: Whitworks!!!!