Melamine mold for floor panels

[Tampa Bay Mike]

So reading Cale's rebuild get me thinking (which can often be dangerous lol) and since I had everything laying around in the shop already I decided to set up a small test to see if it would be worth while to set up a mold for making floor panels.

I took a spare piece of 1/4" melamine and put a layer of wax on it and then brushed on some gelcoat and let that kick for about a half hour. Then I came back and added a layer of mat, 2 layers of 1700, and another layer of mat. I then rolled that out to get rid of any air bubbles and excess resin and laid in a scrap piece of coosa and a scrap piece of foam and weighted them down.



After about an hour it felt pretty solid so I pulled the battery off and peeled it up. The gelcoat around the edges came right up but it did stick a little bit right in the center. I am guessing that was from the heat and pressure and probably would have come up easier had I used a few more layers of wax and/or PVA. I trimmed them up with the angle grinder and was very impressed overall. They are as smooth as glass.





This was with very minimal sanding mainly to remove the stuck pieces of melamine. The next time I try it I will definitely use more wax and PVA to help it release cleaner, and go a little thicker on the gelcoat. I may let it cure a little longer too to see if that helps it release cleaner.

Again, this was just a small scale test so I am happy to hear any comments you may have to make it easier the next time. Hopefully someone finds this useful and can minimize (not eliminate) their fairing time.

[RickK]

Looks good.  I'm sure that is how the makers of the "liners" did it with the exception that they had the non-skid portion for the floor, in the mold too.
You guys were talking about doing this to panels and then taping them together in the boat. I think you would disappointed in the results and all the fairing to smooth out the humps of the tape.  You'd always be able to see those seams, even after texturing for non-skid. So why not do the entire floor at the same time - I realize that you'd have to make a huge mold with melamine but the result would be a smooth floor front to back.  Maybe this is a good vacuum bag opportunity?

[Tampa Bay Mike]

Agreed. This was more of a proof of concept test, but if I was going to take the time to set this up full scale I would want to go ahead and try to do the whole floor at once. It just makes sense considering if you're doing this the idea is to have a very flat surface and there's no way you could maintain that if you need to tape seams together.

[Mwar410]

You’d still have the fairing of the deck to hull tabs, correct? I was thinking of this to do the underneath of the floor (minus the gel coat) for that seamless fit. That’s how a buddy of mine lays up some pretty big panels, multiple sheet melamine  table that they just wax. The table is truer/flatter than a cement slab.

[Tampa Bay Mike]

Yeah, the deck to hull joint on the front, back and sides would still need to tabbed and faired but I think we could blend that into the taped off nonskid pattern fairly easily.

[Crives92]

Thanks for doing the test mike. This is interesting no doubt. I think a giant melamine floor mold would be worth a shot if you do plan on doing your friends 200. The worst that can happen is you have to sand and fair.....that is the beauty and downfall of fiberglass all in one. It can always be fixed, but it's a pain in the a$$$.