Reply To: Recommendations on Repair Shop?

#23991
Nick Heath

Here’s a thought. Kevlar (aramid) laminates are thinner and more flexible than glass fiber laminates, but I believe they mostly use the same top layer of  gelcoat, which itself  is not structural. It is quite common for a kevlar laminate to have a surface crack that is only the surface layer and has not affected the underlying structure. You still need to repair it, because you don’t want water penetrating the structural layer and weakening it through delamination.  How similar the gelcoat is in both laminates I’m unsure: standard gelcoat and standard fibreglass use a polyester resin whereas the kevlar laminate needs a more expensive, more hazardous epoxy resin, which normally does not bond well with a (cured) polyester resin, but I expect the builders get around  this incompatibility by adding the epoxy-bonded layers to the mold before the gelcoat has cured, hence getting a v solid bond.

Sorry – this might be pure b.s. and is certainly more than you wanted to know!