fiberglass epoxy corners

[davidpm]

I've got some inside corners in a boat that the plans called for reinforcing with fiberglass tape and thickened epoxy.
The process is actually pretty easy.
1. Coat both pieces of plywood with neet epoxy.
2. Lay bead of thickened epoxy in the corner to make a fillet.
3. Wet out glass and carefully place over soft fillet and fill glass weave with epoxy.

I then go over the whole thing with epoxy thickened with micro-balloons to get a smooth sand-able surface.
The process works OK but I'm imagining an easier way.

If I could find some noodle like material about the thickness of a pencil led that I could temporarily stick down near the corner then I would have a screed to get a perfect thickness of material to cover the tape and feather out to the ply.
Pick up the noodle and fill the fillet corner and I would be done in two passes.

Because of the trouble getting the thickness right now it takes a couple extra passes to get it right.

Any tricks anyone has come up with to make these kind of corners easier?

[bljones]

You're doing it in the wrong order. If you want to work wet on wet, you really don't need a pre-coat of epoxy before laying in your thickened epoxy.
Sand your corners, clean them with thinner, then lay your bead of thickened epoxy, then tool the bead into a fillet with a tongue depressor, popsicle stick, whatever. THEN lay down your fiberglass tape, and roll epoxy on to fill the weave with a corner roller, or pre-wet your tape and then fit it with your popsicle stick or tongue depressor. The when it kicks, lay on another layer of epoxy to level it out. Done.

[SloopJonB]

Originally Posted by bljones

You're doing it in the wrong order. If you want to work wet on wet, you really don't need a pre-coat of epoxy before laying in your thickened epoxy.
Sand your corners, clean them with thinner, then lay your bead of thickened epoxy, then tool the bead into a fillet with a tongue depressor, popsicle stick, whatever. THEN lay down your fiberglass tape, and roll epoxy on to fill the weave with a corner roller, or pre-wet your tape and then fit it with your popsicle stick or tongue depressor. The when it kicks, lay on another layer of epoxy to level it out. Done.

BLJ has it right but I do one thing differently that I find makes it easier to get a good finish - DON'T try to lay the glass on top of an uncured fillet. Make your fillet as he describes and leave it to kick. When it has, wash it to remove the amine blush, scuff sand it enough to clean off any little lumps or other bits of irregularity and then put your glass tape down - I generally prefer to pre-wet the glass tape if that is what I'm using. If you are using larger pieces of fabric it's usually better to wet it in place.