I have a Bounce SUP board that I bought used, for $125, from a rental company in Austin Tx. It was made with a “thermal composite” technology, which uses fiberglass but instead of epoxy they “infuse the thermoplastic resin into fiberglass cloth.”
Well I love the board, but I am getting fiberglass rash every time i touch the stupid thing. I am hoping there is way to can refinish the board or repair it? I’d basically have to reseal the entire board, other than the padded area. The company only suggest things to repair cracks or dings, and the rental company suggested I “clear coat” the board. I don’t even know where to start with all this and was hoping someone smarter than I could point me in the right direction. Any thoughts?
May I suggest water shoes and paddling gloves. I know that’s probably not what you want to hear but it would solve your problem. At least temporarily until someone can advise you on coating the board. Having a professional do it may cost you more than the board. With YouTube you could look up how to do it yourself.
Take it back to the rental company and ask for your money back. If they don’t do that make sure you write several nasty reviews on Yelp, Google, Facebook etc. Also mention the rental company in this thread. They knew there was bad fiberglass exposure when they sold it for $150, they also knew you had no idea what you were looking at. Not exactly a nice business.
If they won’t take it back, cut it up and throw it away, and look for a decent board. You are going to spend a lot to coat it and it is a POS, not worth it.
Yeah. I try to stay covered when i use or carry the board.
But honestly i bought it knowing it needed some work. But $150 for a board, a paddle, and a leash was well worth it. Even if i have to put that much into it, it’ll be worth it to have a great performing board that i’m not afraid to throw around. And it gives me a project to do during the shelter in place, haha!
I would ask on a sup specific site, those folks usually know a lot about the care and feeding of boards.
It might not be that hard to put some fiberglass cloth on the spots where you handle and stand on it and hit it with a coat of resin. But if you don’t prep it correctly and use the right materials you could end up with a mess.
This sounds and looks a lot like the Twin-tex material that Esquif canoe tried for a couple of models of canoes. It was a commercial failure.
Twin-tex is polypropylene infused into fiberglass roving. I did extensive repairs to a Twin-tex canoe which were successful, but the material is miserable to work with. As the surface of the material gets abrades, tiny fiberglass fibers shed from the hull. The effect is much worse than the typical fiberglass rash in that the tiny little pieces of fiber seem to be coated with plastic that makes them like little needles.
I don’t know if you checked out the website for that company. Here is a FAQ that gives a some suggestions for repair:
And here is a pdf that describes repair of that material using thermal welding:
Note that the manufacturer recommends using West System G Flex epoxy for repairs that cannot be done by thermal welding.
I can tell you a few things you might not want to here. Conventional epoxy will probably not bond well to that material. Unfortunately, polypropylene is rather chemically-inert and not much wants to stick to it in any durable fashion.
G Flex epoxy probably will work based on my experience repairing the Twin-tex canoe. G Flex does not bond to polypropylene in any durable way but it will bond well to any fiberglass that is not completely coated with plastic. If you want to try to get G Flex to bond to the boat, you will need to sand the surface thoroughly to expose naked fiberglass fibers (which will be a fairly miserable experience) and I would also suggest pre-treating the surface with flame oxidation with a handheld propane torch. This has to be done very carefully to avoid melting the material.
Having said that I think it will be highly impractical as in time-consuming, expensive, and unpleasant, to try to coat the entire board with G Flex epoxy and it might not even work. Likewise applying a complete blanket of fiberglass to the board, although you might try bonding fiberglass to limited contact areas using G Flex.
If you do purchase G Flex the instructions include information on how to go about doing the flame oxidation pre-treatment. You could use a fairly light weight of plain weave fiberglass cloth, like 4 ounce/square yard if you want to try to do that. The cost of the G Flex would outweigh the cost of the fabric.
I use Gflex Epoxy for my waveski and SUP repairs, I also use it for laminating bows. it’s not cheap, and it’s not very good at penetrating into old layers of fiberglass. I would take the board back to them as I said above. If you only had a small area to fix it would be OK to try, but it’s not worth the cost and time if you do.
Yeah that sounds like what I’m experiencing with the fiberglass shedding.
I did see those links, but even the the West Systems kit is for localized repairs and I need to cover the whole thing. Also from what I have seen, that epoxy doesn’t dry clear, but some nasty putrid yellow color.
Honestly at this point I’m considering just throwing some type of clear coat over the whole thing and hoping that does the trick. If I get one more season out of the board, then that’s good enough for me. I’ve already got my money’s worth from it. Thanks for the suggestions so far y’all.
Have you had any luck finding something to “clear coat” the board? We have the exact same problem! The kids get burning rashes when they are touching the board! Any help is great!! Thanks
if it is made of a material to which epoxy will bond, I would suggest trying System Three Clear Coat epoxy. It mixes easily in a 2:1 ratio of resin to hardener by volume.
It levels out much better than conventional epoxy as it is a “low-viscosity, penetrating epoxy” and it cures clear. Also works well on wood and can be covered with marine varnish if desired.
Hey Debra. I did have a friend suggest some surf board epoxy, but it all seemed for more trouble than it was worth. I sold the paddle board (with full disclosure to the buyer) a while back.
Honestly, I just was able to always have something between my body and the board. I slung a life jacket over the board while carrying it under my arm so I wouldn’t touch it. And then I just stayed on the padded standing area while on it.
If I were you, I would reach out to a canoe/kayak shop to see if they know someone to repair it. The board I used was from a company that had a proprietary fiberglass technique so it was really wonky. They’ve since gone out of business.