As Promised . . .

This morning, once the shop warmed with the sunshine, I removed yesterday's clamps.  Used the cabinet scraper to cut back the epoxy over-runs and gave the area a light sanding too.

After lunch, I applied the first coat of varnish to the decks and rails.

Slotted Inwale Installed

Another big step today!  This morning, I glued and nailed the spacers to the top of the sides of the boat.  They went in nicely and with the air-nailer, very quickly too.

I had varnished the edges of the little spacers, but I had not varnished either the hull, nor the back side of the rail.  Took awhile to do those, but the varnish dried very quickly so I went on to gluing the rail in place.

After lunch today, I 'buttered' each of the spacers with thickened epoxy then used clamps to hold the inner rail exactly where I wanted.  That part of the process worked very nicely this morning, without slippery glue.  With the epoxy making the joins much more difficult to locate, I had to use more clamps, little sticks to coax the rail to stay in place and a bridge of a 2x4 across the hull to anchor a couple more clamps.

So, these pictures are a work in progress.  Tomorrow I shall sand, varnish and post again.

Inwale Spacers

Yesterday, I started working on the spacers for the inwale.  I want to use a nice, light and light-coloured wood.  Trouble is that spruce and pine are so soft and fibrous that the drills tear rather than cut cleanly.

With previous boats, I was able to set up a jig on the drill press and slide the wood strips to the proper place under the drill bit.  The bit would carve a nice arc into the end of the wood, and at the same time carve the arc into the leading edge of the next segment.  Worked well with fir.

I tried a number of drills and hole cutters, but each of them left a torn surface instead of nice and smooth.  I finally gave up and came in to supper.  This morning, I tried using a hole saw and that was better, but still required sanding or filing.

Online, I found nice router bits with round cutting heads, like a mushroom.  In order to try out the possibility, I experimented with one of my regular router bits.
I set up my router table and ran the end grain through the bit.  Came out smooth, rather than  ragged and torn.

The next picture shows my router table set up with the new router bit.  The piece of wood that I want to cut is clamped to a sliding guide which moves along the top of a board.  That board is clamped next to the cutting head.

The new operation has only a few steps.  Cut the piece to length on the chop saw.  Run the end of the piece (with the help of a fence, guide and a clamp) over the top of the bit.  Flip the piece of wood around and repeat on the opposite end!  Very nicely done.

 Sorry it is so blurry, but I hope you get the idea.

In this last shot, I have nearly 70 of these insert pieces all coved and clamped together so I can varnish the edges.  Once that is done, I shall glue them to the inside rim of the boat, in preparation for the inner rail.

Alan, attached are a few pictures I just took.  They are as-is, and will look better once I sand and varnish.

The first one is of the proposed slotted rail.  The thickness of the apacer and long rail is the same as on my canoe and that looks nice.  I would like to use this light coloured wood for the spacers to accent the decking on the seats.  Make the rails look more delicate too.

What do you think?

Living Colour!

Today is very exciting!   I am satisfied with the epoxy work inside the boat and I have covered it with paint!

The seams and joins have at least three coats of epoxy and subsequent sandings.

The paint is an exterior paint from Benjamin Moore.

The top of the sides has been masked to allow for the inwale to be attached.

The floatation tanks have yet to be painted.  Access hatches have to be cut into the tops and some seat supports need to be glued in first.  I chose a pine plywood for the tops.  I like its colour and it's light.  Turns out to need some stiffeners on the underside.

On with the show!

Floatation Tanks

Since my last entry, the weather has turned more spring like, allowing the epoxy to cure over most nights.

After the rubrails were installed, the hull felt a lot stiffer.  Time to install the floatation tanks.  I went back to my earlier calculations and decided to allow the tank in the bow to follow the chine between bilge and top panel.  At the rear, it was decided to make the tank with two levels.  The forward level would, like the bow, follow the chine.  The aft section of the tank would go to the top of the hull.

It was easy to take the measurements from the hull, and I used left over marine plywood.

However, I did not have sufficient left-over plywood to make the tops of the tanks, so I had to buy another sheet.  As the tops will be sealed on both sides and not required to make any bends, I used a sheet of pine, with nice grain.  Much cheaper and lighter than the imported marine grade.

Today, I cut out the tops and set them aside.

I cut out the keel and screwed and glued that into place today.

I made and installed internal braces to support the tops of the tanks as they will be used as seats for the passengers.

This part of the build is great entertainment.

I love the look of the tanks with their lids in place.