I finished a surf rod for a customer and it came out beautiful! Diamond wrap and guide wraps are flawless. As a final step I decided to put the Lamigals water decal on the rod even though I make it a habit to not use decals. Laid out the decal, let it dry and then put a coat of Flex Coat high build on it the next day. When the finish dried I looked at the decal and it had completely lifted with the exception of a thin line down the middle of the decal. It looks pretty bad. Question. How can I remedy the situation? I can't put wraps over the area because the sticker is about three inches long and it would look like I tried to cover it up because it is between the diamond wrap and the customer's name. Can't put a decal on top because I don't like decals to begin with. Can I safely sand it down and then recoat with finish? How would I go about sanding it? Tried using a Dremmel tool with a wire brush and that seemed to take off the epoxy but I am nervous what that would do to the blank. Help me, please...

The only safe way to sand that area is by block sanding. Wrap some sandpaper around a wood block and and go about it that way. That will guarantee you a flat and even surface when done.

After you've done that, you can decide whether to just refinish the area, make a thread wrap over it, apply another decal, etc.

...........

Did you try just plain peeling the epoxy off? It usually doesn't stick the blank itself that well.

What grit # sandpaper would you suggest?
Thanks for you replies!

Scott,

I use 400 then 600 then 800

Hank
On The Rocks Fishing
Wells, ME.

Bummer. I have had this very same situation to me, also on a lami blank. All is not lost. Since then I use color preserver to bond the decal to the blank before applying finish.

I taped off the area on either side of the decal/finish with several layers of masking tape. Warmed the finish and removed the finish - used a utility knife to scrape the finish off. Yes, it is safe IF DONE CAREFULLY AND PROPERLY. I scraped off everthing down to the bare blank, the utility knife scraped everything off and i did not have to sand anything. Hold the knife exactly perpendicular and do not attempt to "shave" the material off, or make a sawing motion. Scrape only in long strokes.. I removed the tape and cleaned area with alcohol. I then applied a very thin coat of finish to recoat the area whose factory finish I had scraped off, covering area exactly to the edges of the scraped off area. Let cure while rotating. The repair edges are still visible at this point. The next day I applied another decal using color preserver. Let dry. Then recoated area with a coat of finish. This last coat's edges right over the edges of the repaired area. The repair is invisible., even under magnification. I may have another lami decal laying around if yout want it. I'll check in the morning since I am not near the rod bench at the moment. email me if you want it.

Lou

Lou,
Thanks for the offer for the extra decal and the advice on how to fix the rod. I tried to email you but your address comes up as "hidden". Can you send your email address to smL768@optonline.net. Thanks!

Scott

You can also use MEK to soften the epoxy and peel it off with your thumbnail , this will work especially if you only have one coat of epoxy , and not too thick . You don't have to scrub the mek on just wipe the whole area down with it and let it sit a little , then scrape a little , try to get a leading edge , and use more mek as needed . Sometimes using heat to remove epoxy also removes the paint from your blank , and sandpaper will too . Mek can also remove paint from the blank but it won't do it as fast as heat or sandpaper will. Wear gloves it's nasty stuff.

Shai

Scott,
In the future when you apply a large decal like the one you have applied you may want to put a decorative wrap of some sort at each end of the decal so that the edge of the wrap just covers the end of the decal with a few wraps of thread. This will hold the decal in place and hold down the four corners of the decal.