best glue for laminated beam

I am refurbishing a 1981 Ta Ciao trawler. I am replacing a curved laminated beam in the Stateroom that was completely rotted out. To match the other beams I am using 3/8 in strips of mahogany. What would be the best glue to use for this. I am thinking of either an extremely strong waterproof glue (like gorilla glue) or just using epoxy. Any recommendations?

Randy

Epoxy always works well, tho in a laminated beam case (flat stuff) its gap filling ability is not required.

Good rubber gloves ARE required , as is a good detergent wash down after curing.

Any PL glue (like Gorilla) will be fine , and box store PL is 1/2 the cost of much advertised Gorilla.

Titebond III is also waterproof and the easiest to work with as after clamping the excess can be wiped off with a wet rag.

AS you may not have a plainer to trim the laminate , this ability to get it right then clean up easily would make the water proof Titebond my choice.

Epoxy is todays adhesive of choice in wooden boat building (IMHO). Here's a link for a boat and mast where epoxy is used extensively.

Building 72' schooner in Viet Nam - Page 28

Also look at Gougeon Brothers on Boat Construction: Wood and West System Materials.

Gougeon Brothers on Boat Construction: Wood and West System Materials: Meade Gougeon: 9781878207500: Amazon.com: Books

Titebond III, "what he said" wonderful stuff above waterline. Even the older Titebond II was great, I did all my interior work with it.

Epoxy

Being that the original beam was likely laminated with resorcinol glue, any of the above would probably be better.

I'm an epoxy guy myself. PU is a bugger to clean up, and my fingers are black for days. I don't care much for the taste of PVA glue.

Sounds like a fun project. What will you use as a mold to bend the new beam around?
Either epoxy or Titebond III should work. I hate working with Gorilla type glues.

For shaping the beam I pulled another beam and am using that to set the curve for the new beam. The existing beams are laminated 3/8 mahogany. The only real challenge is finding an inexpensive wood shop to resaw 4/4 mahogany to 3/8. It's good to know that I can use better wood glues for this having used both Gorilla and titebond on woodworking projects in the past. Randy

Regardless of the glue if the leaking is not stopped the wood will leave.

As our boat is not built for pretty , we chose to band saw treated lumber (2x10) to the proper camber , wait a year to outgass and then paint it.

A single layer of 1/4 inch 5 ply mahog covers the lower beam edges and holds the sound damping overhead planks in place .

Northern Spy said:

Being that the original beam was likely laminated with resorcinol glue, any of the above would probably be better.

I'm an epoxy guy myself. PU is a bugger to clean up, and my fingers are black for days. I don't care much for the taste of PVA glue.

Click to expand...

Have you ever noticed that in a lot of hardware stores they sell the disposable gloves right next to the glues?
HOLLYWOOD

Judging from much use no high tech stuff is needed here. Rescorcinal glue (the purple stuff) or Weldwood (brown) powder type glue that you mix w water will be 100% satisfactory. The beam was probably made w one of the two glues.

I'm not sure but I think plywood and construction "glue lams" are assembled w Weldwood type glues.

These glues have been widely used in boat building since the 50s.

The downfall of Rescorcinal glue (the purple stuff) or Weldwood (brown) powder type glue is the fit of the pieces MUST be excellent.

Epoxy and PL are great for amateur hour as both have gap filling properties.

Both must be used with rubber gloves.

Just FYI, we are dealing with all the topside leaks at the same time so no fear there. The PO's pulled some fittings from over the rear stateroom in addition to drilling a hole through the roof under the flybridge console for no apparent reason I can see.

I'll probably use titebond for this as I've worked with it extensively in cabinet building and its cheap (also have a couple bottles of titebond III hanging around already). Wasn't sure if I needed epoxy for something like this, although I'm replacing a rear deck section and will be using copious amounts of epoxy for that.

Randy

Filled epoxy and a small internal backing plate might be ideal to fill numerous old holes.

I just glued up a new replacement mast and anchor plank out of solid ipe and I used west systems new Gflex epoxy and I'm pretty impressed with it. Messy but it will fill gaps and flex without getting brittle. I just bought some more for some other crack sealing projects on my boat.

use a thickened epoxy paste like Wet Dry 700 (which can also be applied underwater and has a history of saving sinking yachts and leaking swimming pools) - take care not to clamp too tightly - with epoxies if you clamp tightly you sqeeze out all the epoxy and the bond fails - this is different from using glues

paul