Epoxy Resin vs. Vinyl Ester Resn?

Vinylester is a good resin. CC used it to build their hulls from '89 to '92 (AME4000). Pretty sure the stuff they use now (AME 5000) is a vinyl-epoxy blend. Prior to '89, they used poly.

When youre building boats (or repairing them) and you have an opportunity to cut 20% off the price of one of your major components (resin), thats a HUGE cost savings. You can pass that savings along to the customer, giving you a competitive advantage, or put it in your pocket.

On a single boat project, youre only talking 10-15 gallons of resin. The extra cost of epoxy is only going to run you $100-150, as you can get a good epoxy for $50/gal, vs. $40/gal for vinyl. (Hopefully youre not looking at West System for your epoxy, btw- now THAT is what I call cost prohibitive!) $150 in the scheme of the rebuild costs for one boat is a drop in the bucket- especially considering the amount of labor involved. Most here use epoxy because the cost difference is small, epoxy is superior in terms of strength, and its very nice to work with. Getting the ratio of hardener correct on vinyl can be tricky, you have to use wax to get it to fully set up, and it produces just a *touch* more odor.

That being said, vinyl is still a perfectly acceptable way to go. We've seen good rebuilds using poly as well (like Hasbeenskier's). Personally, having used all 3, I'll stick with epoxy for the structure on all of my personal boats!

Cuda Chris wrote: The reason I posted this question is because I met with a very notable marine repair guy in my area that swears by the stuff and gave me a hundred reasons why I should just go vinyl ester vs epoxy. He has a huge resume and has built, repaired and patched everything under the sun.

He also needs to make $$$$$$.

If you are doing it for money and are not married to it then you would save the couple of extra hundred dollars and put it in your pocket. In my case, I do not ever plan to get rid of my boat so the better material for slightly more money just made sense to me.

With that said the VE is not bad, its just not the BEST. When looking at your good, better, best options, there is PE, VE, and Epoxy. It all comes down to chemistry.   When it comes to resin prices its all about the quantity discount. You want to buy it all at once or you will end up paying a lot more for it. Look at 10 gallon kits.

Vinyl ester is stinkier

Well! I used all vinylester, my project turned out great? read the pro,s and con,s hope i made the right decision? cost is a factor. good luck in your decision! jeff

Keeganino wrote: You Read so much about epoxy on here because it is hands down the best material for the job.

I agree. The vinyl is a compromise. It's less expensive and the reason many of the boat builders are using it. At least most got away from using the poly and all the problems that come with it!

I have read the pros and cons of using epoxy over vinyl ester or vinyl ester over epoxy. Most of what I have read on this forum involves the use of epoxy based resins. Has anyone used vinyl ester resins?

Looking for some insight.

Cheers!