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.

Rub Rails

Another stunning day in Campbell River!  Yesterday, I took the First Mate to the lake and rowed for about an hour.  That was my reward for getting rub rails ready for today's epoxy.  I started with a 20' plank and planed it down to the desired thickness.  Table saw cut the plank into two beautiful strips.

The rails are 1 1/2" by 3/4" red cedar.  Beautiful old growth, fine grained and light wood.  Perfect for a light rowing boat; one that does not want to do a lot of banging into docks and rocks.

This morning, while it was still too cold in my shop for epoxy to cure, I cut the rails to length and cut a taper into each of their ends.  See if you can see them in the attached pictures.

The rails were given a couple of coats of thickened epoxy on their mating surfaces then clamped into place.  A few sticks of stainless steel brads will keep everything in place until the epoxy is cured.

I hope the epoxy sets up before the temperature drops.  If not, I shall again make a tent over the boat and put in a heater.

Upright Again

Monday, February 16, I had a few hours of sanding to cut the epoxy back and feather the edges.  Last attempt at grinding epoxy was using my big Makita variable speed grinder/sander.  This time, I wanted to use the lighter and less aggressive orbital sander.

That sander was equipped with velcro pad to hold the sandpaper.  years of grit and over heating the sandpaper caused the little hooks to plug up and perhaps melt a bit with the heat.  To remedy that, I had glued on a circle of light plywood covered with some counter-top arborite.  When I tried that, the sandpaper flew off with the vibration and speed of the disc.

One of the sites I visited with this problem, suggested heating the arborite face with the heat gun before sticking on the paper.  That is a miracle!  Paper sticks like crazy!

As I mentioned, it took a couple of hours to grind back all the seams and the bottom panel of the boat too.

Yesterday morning, I washed the dust off the boat and took a few pictures.  Nothing like a wet surface to show off every run and depression.  No time to fix them now.  I am anxious to get on to working the interior!

Using slings, I rolled the very light boat back onto its base.

I levelled it, both fore and aft as well as abeam.  I am adding seats and they should be level when the boat is on the water.

I replaced the temporary bulkheads with cross braces.  They help to firm up the boat, but it needs some stiffening along the top edges, so I think the rub rails ought to go on soon.

From there, I will use one grinder or another to minimize the little epoxy fillets I put into the seams.  That will allow me to make nice smooth fillets and cover them with fiberglass strips.

Fibreglass and Epoxy Work

Last Friday, I started early and worked until dinner time.  I knew it would be a long day of applying fibreglass cloth to the base of the boat then sealing it with epoxy.

The plans call for a layer of cloth on the whole bottom panel and two strips of cloth on the seams.  I epoxied the cloth on the bottom panel, allowing the cloth to drape over the edge onto the bilge panel.  I then laid a strip of cloth over the wet epoxy/cloth on the seam.  Two layers of cloth were applied to the seam between the bilge panel and the side or top panel.  Two layers of cloth were epoxied on to the join between panels and transom as well as the long seam reaching forward to the stem of the boat

The work took a long time as the epoxy was cooling as the day went on, plus the boat was cold, making the epoxy stiff and hard to work into the cloth and the wood.  As well as more time, I am sure the work took a lot more epoxy than if I'd done the work in a nicely heated shop.

I have quite a bit of fibreglass cloth left over from other projects and wanted to use that instead of buying new.  However, as soon as that cloth was cut, it started to unravel.  Perhaps because I have folded and refolded that cloth so often, it had loosened and it came apart willingly.  As my gloves got sticky and the epoxy spread around, the cloth seemed to catch and fray at an accelerating rate.  By the time I got everything in place, I had great bird's nests of cloth stuck to my boots and gloves as well as sprouting like fibrous anemones from the bottom of the boat.

I have attached one picture of the cloth draped over the bottom panel, ready for epoxy.  Pictures below show the boat after an hour with the grinder.  Final pictures were taken just now, after I applied more epoxy and filler to smooth the edges of the cloth.

Back To Work

It has been a month since my last entry.  Shortly after I wrote that message, I began a long bout with the flu which turned into bronchial pneumonia.

 I took a couple of weeks off the job at Walmart, but continued to go in very early to do the work on the Bread Wall.

A couple of weeks ago, I finally gave up and went to the doctor.  After listening to my chest, she declared I sounded like an aging asthmatic.  She prescribed $150 of medications and sent me back to bed.  I asked whether it started as the flu, but she couldn't tell without doing some tests.  I wasn't coughing up anything gross enough to use as a lab sample, so I am only presuming how it started.

Lately, I have been strong enough to go back to work in Produce.  I have been laid off from the Bread Wall due to the company's restructuring, so I am only doing Produce.

In the boat shop, I have made some progress.

In the previous episode, I had stitched up the seams, filled the gaps between stitches with epoxy and rigged a tent to help the epoxy cure.  That worked marvellously!

Days later,

I removed the wire stitches and filled the gaps in the epoxy with more of the mixture.  Once everything was cured, I used a cabinet scraper to remove most of the stuff then followed with a big sander to remove the rest.

Further applications of epoxy and subsequent sandings have made the boat nearly ready for applying strips of fibreglass cloth on all the joins, plus a full layer of cloth and epoxy on the bottom panel.  A sanding this morning followed by laying out the cloth.  It will be a long day of applying epoxy, so I am waiting until I have a long uninterrupted day.  Also coincidental that tomorrow will be warm enough in the unheated shop.

All very exciting.

Cold Weather Adaptation

The next couple of weeks are predicted to be too cold for epoxy to set in my unheated shop.  I am into a series of little dabs here and there, and it would be so handy to keep working a few hours at a time.

Here is my solution.

Today, I took the epoxy from the nice, warm house, out to the shop where I mixed up a few batches with lots of structural filler.  I filled the gaps between the wire stitches on the outside of the hull.

I bent all the wire stitches to stand straight up.

Then I parked a heater beneath the boat.

And covered everything with a tarp!

I have a thermometer under the boat and will check the temperature in a few hours.  I love doing these projects that encourage creative thinking.

Humphrey

Saturday, Alan came over for a look at the final hull shape.  The stitching was done, cinching everything into shape.  We discussed the built-in buoyancy and agreed that the two level tanks will be a great way to go, providing copious amounts of emergency floatation as well as comfortable seating, bow and stern.

Later that day, I went back out to the shop and mixed up epoxy with structural filler.  Filled in the spaces between the stitches.  I work Sundays, so that would give the epoxy time to set before I was free again.

Yesterday afternoon, my son came by and helped me roll the hull over, so I could work on the exterior.  His wonderful artist/engineer's eye noticed some bulges in the bottom panel!  I was aghast!  At a loss for a way to correct them.  Logan pointed out that some of the panels may be slightly too wide.  Of course.  Brilliant.  Just run the saw down the joints to cut back the panels.

This morning, I returned to the shop.  Pulled a few stitches and cut through the epoxy fillers with the jig saw.  Took a few cuts to remove enough material, but I am so relieved to see that he was right!  

I expect, when I tell Logan he saw, then solved the problem in the blink of an eye, that he will react much like Sheldon on Big Bang Theory.  "Of course."

I never took any pictures of the hull before the corrections, but I am more than pleased to post a few 'afters'

I just published this entry and reread the title.  I thought I would explain it, but no.  If you don't get it. let me know in the comments.

Merry Christmas,  Gerry