how do you smooth out the fuzzy plastic on poly hulls
Iron? heat gun?
Drag em a couple hundred yards
on a nice sandy beach
jack L
ya right
good one.
You Don’t
No need to make it pretty. Embrace the fuxxy. It signifies a kayak that gets used over and over. Like the lines on an old man’s face, the scratches and dings tell a story of their own.
And heating it up could do more harm than good…
Fuz
Seriously, just use a razor that guys use to shave their heads.
Cabinet scraper (no kiddin’)
an’ dis be fro’ a canooist…
FE
I’m with jimyaker
Don’t sweat the fuzz.
Those might work
if anybody knew how to sharpen one.
I’ve gone the heat gun route and didn’t
appear to hurt anything. Just go slow and don’t over heat.
Laundry Iron ???
Three question marks because I am just whistling Dixie… I’ve never tried it. Seems like it would work and push the fuzz back into the scratch layer, vs a heat gun that is just going to melt the fuzz into little balls. Start on a low heat setting and then turn it up until you find THE setting.
Don’t tell your wife for what you are borrowing the iron. Or, use that old iron you use to wax your skis.
Then again, dragging the boat on the beach should work just as well. If you can find some sand dunes, maybe you can “paddle” down the face of a dune.
~~Chip
~~Chip
wet sanding
You can wet sand polyethylene if you want to put in the effort. And yes, you can use a heat gun or even a propane torch if you exercise caution.
Flame treating polyethylene is a necessary step to allow urethane adhesive or G-Flex epoxy to bond to it and it have done it often. Apply just the tip of the blue inner cone of the flame to contact the hull surface and keep the flame moving. If you do it correctly the hull will be just a little warm to the touch afterward.
heat gun
did you troul it or tool it at all once the plastic was hot?
wet sanding
what sort of sand paper or block, grit etc…
any details would be appreciated. this seem like the safest option
thanks
sanding
Probably start with 180 or 220 grit and work on down: 400 grit, 600 grit, 800 grit and if you have enough patience you can go down to 1500 grit (or 2000).
Propane torch
is what they use on plastic furniture but really why bother ?
Never bothered with it
Owned a Dagger Crossover for 10 years now, paddling
many, many miles all year 'round and have never ever
done any mechanical “process” to the hull bottom.
Material = EXL™ superlinear polyethylene
What willi said
We have a couple of Necky plastic boats in the “fleet” which carry the usual markings of use. Never considered trying to scrape/sand/melt them off. Doesn’t hurt anything, so why bother?
its getting
really scraped up has a few heavy gouges.
if you have gouges that need repair
vs. just cosmetic scrapes, look into a “KC welder”:
http://www.urethanesupply.com/kcwelder.php
they have polyethylene material in different colors to match your boat which you melt in to fill a gouge; just takes a steady hand and care not to burn thru the hull. with the included mesh you can even fix a crack or puncture.
Where are people paddling ?
Michigan has rocks, rebar, concrete, sheet metal, etc.
and sure I have a few scrapes over 10 years, but
geeesh man, – gouges that needs filling in via heat ???
Are people paddling over flooded garbage dumps or what ?