I've been doing some experimenting and can offer you a couple of ideas. First, I've successfully used Zar stain under system three. Did several experiments and the glass seems to hold fine on it. I tried a water based stain and didn't like the raised grain, the price, or the color. I already have several colors of Zar and was able to mix it to the color I was looking for. System three also suggests Minwax and Daly's, but haven't tried them.

The guys at the local wood store (they sell supplies as well as do custom woodworking) use Zar extensively and like it a lot. Here's the really interesting thing, though. They use it to stain moulded fiberglass wood-like doors. The things look pretty darn good. Based on that, they encouraged me to try staining AFTER epoxy. So far, I've only experimented. I've sanded the epoxy down as I would for varnishing, applied the stain, waited awhile, then wiped it off. I've gotten variable results. Once the stain took reasonably well; the next time, it changed color only faintly. My third try, I put the stain on a varnished piece of interior mahogony boat trim that I no longer need. Lightly sanded the old varnish, applied the stain, and it took beautifully. The color is rich and the wood grain comes through without cloudiness. New varnish went over the top just fine. It was very impressive. Haven't done anything else, but I plan to use that to darken the hatches on my Artic Tern when I varnish it using that technique (darkened the coaming on it before glassing it). Like I said, all I've done is a scrap piece, but I think its a success.

: I am building a custom wooden bathtub between boats and would like to stain
: part of the wood before glassing. Has anyone out there successfully done
: this? Will the epoxy and glass bond correctly with the stained wood?

: I use System Three epoxy. Should I use water based or oil based stain or does
: it matter? Even if well dry, will the stain run when I wet it with epoxy?

: Thanks for you help.

: Randy