2006 building logs

Jan 2006 Attaching the hull panels

Happy New Year. Due to family Christmas and then the extreme heat here on the Central Coast of NSW I have been unable to get any work done on the boat for the past 3 weeks. I knew I wouldn't get any work done after about the 15 Dec as I had to travel interstate for Christmas so the intention was to get some work done around the 27th but then a heat wave hit and bushfires sprang up all around us and it has only just started to cool down. We have had a few emails from people reading the site wondering as to our progress and that has made me feel a little guilty that I have not done anything for so long. I read websites of others and get eager for new instalments so I was conscious that others would be waiting. So to all those that checked to no avail, my apologies. Anyway, we are back into it albeit a slow start.

Jan 4 Preparing to attach first hull panel

I got some very handy presents for Christmas that if I didn't get as presents I would have bought so I will add them to the expenses list at their retail value so as to give a true indication of the costs to build. I guess we all know someone that can help in some way and I might get this for free and someone else might get that but in the end I think we should assume that we have to pay for everything required so that you know what each thing costs. I also bought myself a surform which is shaped like a hand plane but has a long rasp like base, they are easier and faster than rasps but I initially resisted because they are expensive for what they are but with a lot of long hull panels with tabs to remove it is much better.

Thanks to Helen (Jo's Mum), Nat and Graeme and Trina and Darrin (Jo's sisters and their partners) for the wonderful and expensive gifts. I plan to add a cordless circular saw to the battery kit that now consists of a cordless router, 2 batteries and a charger. I don't look forward to using the sander!

I also got a wonderful gift from Jo that will also be very valuable, I got a sextant. Now with gps and electronic charts we will probably never use it but I want to learn how to use it and have it as a safety back up should electronic navigation fail us (loss of battery power for example).

As you can see from the picture below, we are almost ready to start attaching the hull panels to the bulkheads. I have placed the keel panels onto the bulkheads as I intend to temporarily attach them (dry) with screws so that, like we did when gluing the panels everything is marked and goes together faster when glue is applied. We have to glass the inside of the hull panels where they attach to the main bulkheads and Sean attached the panels to the bulkheads whilst that glass was still wet so that you get a chemical bond rather than a mechanical. I think it is a good idea but requires that you work fast because you only get about 20 minutes before the epoxy sets. It is for that reason that I am attaching the panels dry first and also some of these panels are almost symmetrical (same shape from each end or even upside down) so I want to be sure it all fits together without the time pressure of glue going off.

So the plan is to attach all of the hull panels (screw them only), mark them so that putting them back is easier and then remove them again, apply the glue (and fibreglass where appropriate) and re attach them with the screws until the epoxy is well set. There is a fair amount of torsional stress as the flat panels bend to meet the shape required, especially at the bow where there is twist and bend in 2 different directions. This is a job that cannot be done on your own. They are not heavy but the hull panels are too long to manoeuvre into place on your own and to hold correctly in place until screwed down. So progress for a while will be very much dependent on the availability of helpers.

This is probably a little cheeky but anyone interested in helping out in exchange for a first hand, hands on lesson in what is involved in building a Duflex panel kit cat and can make it to the Central Coast of NSW, give me an email! Come just after breakfast, bring your own lunch and go home just before dinner!....Kidding, we will feed you too.

As the cores are balsa and because of the stresses mentioned I think that the screws may not hold well enough so I have some timber cleats to screw down into along each of the bulkheads that create twist in the panels. (This was an idea suggested to me by Sean). The flatter panels I think will be ok except for the chamfer panel which I am told by Sean and other websites I have seen, has a big twist in it and will need a lot of force to pull, push and cajole into place.

A retrospective tip here is to mark the various hull panels as you cut them from the sheets as some are very similarly shaped and the plans show you which is which but it is much harder to determine which is which after you have cut them out and stacked them against a wall for a couple of months! I wish I had. Hans, another builder of the 1230 and has plan 6 (we have plan 5), we met at the Schionning Muster last November and he visited me as I was gluing my panels suggested I do this and I forgot to take his advise! Doh!

A small criticism of the plans here is a little lack of detail in the description of the various panels and exactly where and how they attach to the bulkheads. Whilst most shapes are self explanatory some (the twin keel panels and the very next ones to them either side of the hull) are extremely difficult for an amateur, building for the first time to decipher. I still cant figure out whether I have the keel panels in the photo below around the right way and I have turned them over 3 times, which on your own takes some doing! The bow is self evident but they are a subtly different shape from the centre out and I cant tell which face should run down the middle and which is to the outside of the hull, they have to twist to meet the bow shape which makes it hard for me to get my head around what shape does this correctly/easier/etc. Click here to see what I mean. I don't want to find out the hard way, so I will wait to talk to Brett and the team when they return from their Christmas break on Monday.

Many people will say that boatbuilding is sometimes a "trial and error" pastime anyway, I don't mind this theory but am keen to minimise the error part. Very happy with the trial, just not so keen on the error. The upside to these minor setbacks or shortcomings is that the Schionning team are extremely approachable and helpful, their after sales service is superb and as the plans of any new boat do, as builders such as Hans, Sean and I find the problems in the originals they will improve for subsequent builders. The Schionning team have a genuine interest in all the projects going on, and there are a lot of them, and are as keen as we are to see the boat go together well, especially newer designs like ours.

Jan 9 Glassing the inside of Keelboards

The method I use to attach the hull planks to ensure they are in the correct position fore and aft is to sit them in place (the keel panels) and then bend the bow sections down to meet the 0 bulkhead, then once I am satisfied they meet correctly I attach the panel at the 2 central temp bulkheads and go back to the bow to recheck. If they haven't moved, I can then go along all the other bulkheads and screw them down. For to the rest of the panels, the method is the same, (I need them aligned with the bow) and they are just as easy as they are hanging in the ratchet straps. I figure any discrepancies are easier to fix at the stern hence my ensuring the bow is correct and working from there.

Having found out from Schionning's that the keel panels need to fitted with the curved section to the centreline of the hull, I screwed them to the hull using the above method then removed them again, then removed the peel ply and glassed the 10 sections (at bulkhead 1, 4, 5, 6, 7 on each panel) to cure overnight. I have reconsidered attaching the panels whilst the glass is wet as it is too difficult to get them into place (on my own!) without moving the glass by scraping it as I place the panel into the correct position. On reflection there is little benefit because in the end this gluing is only to hold the panel in place until the fibreglassing is done, has little structural benefit as you are just gluing the panel to a balsa core and 2 x 1mm edges of fibre glass that is already cured (the pre applied glass on the bulkheads). This way you also get a chance to clean the fibreglass up, grind the edges back where it has gone over the edges and prepare the surface for the tapes that will be mechanically bonded to them on the inside of the hull to the bulkheads. This is much easier to do on a workbench flat than up over your head on the inside of the hull before it is turned over, or backbreaking bending to do it on the floor if done after the hull is turned.

So first thing tomorrow, I will clean the edges and score the surface of the glassed areas on the keel panels and then glue and screw them into place. Then whilst they are curing (all day tomorrow) I will glass the rest of the hull panels to start fitting on Wednesday. I am hoping to have the rest of the panels done Wednesday because I have a meeting to attend Thursday and if I can get all the panels fitted except the chamfer, Brett is going to come down to help me attach that on Friday. There is a minor error in the kit cut of the chamfer panel that makes it a little trickier than normal to fit and it is already the toughest to fit under normal circumstances because of the bend, twist and the size of it. It has to be Friday that Brett comes to help because the following Tuesday he goes to America to help another Schionning builder (Jim, the Schionning agent on the US West Coast) with a 1420 under construction. So it's Friday or I get no help, as I can't wait another month to do it. 

So I have to work fast! Because of this I may not be able to take as many photos as I would like but I will do my best. Wish me luck!

 

Jan 10 Keelboards glued, next pair glassed

A full 8 hour day today and it was hot and hard work. I managed to get the keel panels glued and have got the next 2 hull panels (3 & 6) which are the first angle from the keel, you could call them bilge boards, fibreglassed ready for gluing tomorrow. Brett suggested a great method for gluing the panels which also is a great method for anyone (like me) that has to work alone. Instead of temporarily attaching all the panels and then removing them to glue them, I attach the panel in the same way, with just screws but no glue yet, then remove all the screws except the ones into the 2 mdf temporary bulkheads at around the centre of the boat (tbh2 & tbh3 which are between b/h5 and b/h6, the saloon space) which will keep the panel in place but away from the bulkheads for gluing.

You then work from the centre out to the bow and stern one bulkhead at a time, which means you can work at a less frantic pace. You don't have to glue all 9 bulkheads before attaching the panels. Which is a great thing. I mixed enough glue (resin, hardener and microfibre blend 403) for what I thought would be 3 bulkheads, only 2 pumps of each plus filler, and I barely got 1 done and the glue was already going off and I managed 2 before it was gone. So there was no way I was going to be able to glue all the bulkheads before attaching the hull panel.

As I have mentioned there are a few minor errors in the kit cut all minor and fixable, the first was the addition I made to bulkhead 8, there is also a problem with the chamfer panel (I don't yet know the extent but hopefully Brett is going to help me fix that one) and there is also a gap between the keel panel. To fill it I will cut up off to shape and glue them in. No big deal, this is just a core and the whole below waterline section will be over glassed inside and out. The gap is no more than an inch as the pic below shows. You may recall I placed timber blocks at the bow because I didn't think the screws would hold in balsa because of the load, well they wouldn't pull down enough into the blocks and the screw heads pulled through the keel panels. I used ratchet tie down strap to hold it all in place which the glue sets overnight and I also made some fibreglass webs as an addition to hold the bow down. It looks messy but I will grind it flat. The timber pieces are washers to stop the screws pulling through.

After the keel panels were secured, I went to work fibreglassing the inside of the next 2 bulkheads, (the bilgeboards). First I removed the peel ply from where I needed to attach glass or glue to bulkhead. Then I cut the glass to size from the roll. Then I mixed just resin and hardener and brushed it onto the panel, placed the glass on and "wet it out". This means that the glass is completely soaked through from top to panel. You can see the cloth change color from silvery white to an opaqueness that takes on the color of the board behind. The change is clear. You can see the change in the pictures below. The trick here is to put just enough resin on to wet it out without putting too much on, it all adds weight and is not necessary. More does not mean stronger, just heavier.

I try to keep the glass inside the perimeters of the board because any overhang will need to be ground off when set. It is not hard but more work. And be careful of the overhang when it is set because the glass is as sharp as needles and it is like a saw edge and can tear you open if you rub against before you grind or cut it away.

 

One final note. I went through 5 brushes today. The glue was going off faster than I could clean them anyway. I mentioned earlier that it was better to buy quality tools as it ended up cheaper. Not true in all cases. I buy cheap brushes from the Warehouse at .50c to $1 each and throw them away rather than use Acetone or thinners. The acetone is $40 for a 5 litre can! Its cheaper to throw brushes away than try to clean them. Jim in the US tells me that vinegar makes a good solvent. I will give it a try.

Jan 11 Bilgeboards attached

Another tough day. It is still stinking hot and it makes working extremely difficult. I started at 9am and by lunchtime it became apparent that I was not going to be able to keep the schedule we had set in order to have Brett come down and help attach the chamfer panel on Friday. By 1pm I had only managed to screw the next 2 panels in place but still hadn't glued them. So the plan changed. I am now going to attach all of the panels with screws without gluing them so that we can attach the chamfer panel and glue it. I can then go around at my own pace and unscrew the panels and glue them. I have decided that I don't want to build our boat to someone else's schedule again. I want Brett's help with the chamfer panel but he leaves for the US next week and before he returns we depart on a business trip so we will miss each other by 2 month if it isn't this Friday and I have business meetings all day tomorrow, so I had to knock myself out in 35 degrees as I cant wait 2 months and I would rather not attempt this panel alone. So that is definitely the last time!

Anyway enough griping. With the change of plans, I set to work preparing all of the remaining hull panels for attaching to the hull. This involves marking where the bulkheads are and removing the peel ply and then measuring and cutting the glass, then finally wetting it out. It took me half an hours to lift the panels into my work places on 44 gallon drums alongside the hull. Jo helped me lift them and one (the chamfer panel) we had to walk out of the warehouse to turn it end for end. It then took me 3 more hours to remove the peel ply (to protect the panels from glue spills I am only removing it in sections and leaving it on where I don't yet need it removed) and to measure and cut the glass. So at 5pm I set about the wetting out with what I thought was another 2 hours work but Jo pitched in and we got it knocked over in a little over an hour. Jo was fantastic. I am sure you will read all about it in her section of the website, if she ever gets around to writing it! She says someone has to keep working to pay for the boat!

So the plan now is that on Friday morning I will get started early (7am is early for me) and get to grinding the overhangs and if possible attach (screw on) a panel or 2 before Brett arrives. They should go on a little faster as I can reach the screws without climbing up and down ladders. Brett and I will then screw any other panels on and then get to attaching including gluing the chamfer panel. All the other panels are needed in place before the chamfer can go on but screwed on will be enough. Then next week I will glue the rest of them.

You can see from the pics that the ratchet straps are great for lifting panels into position on our own. I just attach one end to the strongback and throw the other end over the keel to the panel to be lifted and then ratchet them up adjusting each strap in turn to the height I need. You can also see that I have not screwed the panels down to the last bulkhead and temp bulkhead as there is some major twist in this section and the screws just pulled out. I will have to attach blocks of harder wood or use the straps to pull them down and hold them. You can also see that I have the next panels in place on 44 gallon drums and have wet out the glass. There are 2 more panels on the other side of the boat hidden from view.

Jan 13 A hull emerges

Friday 13th and I had Brett Schionning down to help with the chamfer panel. As readers of my site will know, we are one of the first building this design and there are some minor gremlins in the kit cut, so Brett wanted to see for himself what they were and how the hull goes together. The past identified errors were a piece of Duflex about the size of a pizza slice that needed adding to bulkhead 8 and the keel panels are shy about 2cm at the widest point so I need to make a long piece to fill the gap. I could just use filler but I think it will be faster and cheaper to make the piece from an off-cut, glue it in and then backfill the rest.

The chamfer panel is under the most stress and has to twist and bend in 3 directions so is also the hardest to apply (and never having attached one I was grateful for the expert help. Having said that, we didn't have too much trouble. The panel as it comes out of the kit is a little out, we had to cut a piece about 15cm wide tapering down to nothing over about 2 meters and I will have to add a similar section to the top of the hull again to build it back up to where the deck curve starts. We placed the panel using the ratchet straps, screwed it into place overlapping where it was oversize. I then I went inside the hull and marked the line against the panel it overlapped and will sit next to when corrected and we removed the chamfer panel again and cut out the overlapping part with a jigsaw, then put the panel back on again. Simple! There is no structural damage. The panel was oversize and had a piece removed, and where it is undersize it is just under the section that will be strip planked and glassed and the glass would cover the section that is missing anyway so again no structural damage or loss of integrity. I would say that all of the extra work from the mistakes would add up to a few hours work at worst. I am still to cut the thin pieces of Duflex to fill the gap in the keel panels and that may take a little while say an hour or 2 at most, the rest have been resolved in less than an hour. If these are the biggest problems I face in the construction I will be very pleased.

The last thing we did on Wednesday was to pre glass the inside of all of the hull panels (the engineering calls for re enforcing glass on top of the glass already on the panels where it meets specific bulkheads to help spread the loads correctly) and before Brett arrived this morning I had also already attached panel 7 (the one directly before the chamfer on the inside of the hull) and panel 2 which is its corresponding panel on the outside of the boat. I have only screwed them in at this stage. I made good use of the ratchet straps and managed to attach both of these panels alone in just over an hour.

We got to work attaching the big panel 1 that finishes the outside of the boat and is the biggest panel of all. This turned out to be a really easy task as I have 44 gallon drums along side the boat and the panel was sitting one them where we had glassed it and it was a simple matter to tip it on its edge and lean it against the bulkheads and it fell just a few mm below where it need to be. Again I slung a ratchet strap over at each end and just cranked it up into position and screwed it down. It was a bit tight here and there so we marked it, took it down, ran a plane along it and replaced it. Also, here and there, wherever the panels met a little too tightly we ran a jigsaw along the join to make the gap wider. It is much easier to apply glue and then fill a small gap than a tightly fitting panel. So at first if you place panels and see small gaps, don't panic, it is better this way and will be much less work. You can glue the hull panel to the bulkheads first and to each other later, rather than having to run a glue line down a 12 meter edge as well as each bulkhead. You will also end up with a better bond as all the glue will remain between the panels rather than be squeezed out by a really tight fitting join.

We then set about attaching the chamfer. We made blocks from timber off cuts to screw into as the balsa may not have held, the same way I did at the bow for the keel and bilge panels. We also made washers from 3mm mdf again from pieces I have saved from the packaging. After we had placed the panel into position the first time, it looked like we needed to make some minor adjustments to its position so as to minimise high and low spots caused by the panels distortions when attached which would need fairing so the less of these the less work later and the less weight and we did this by cutting small notches either in the panel where it fell against an mdf temp or in the bulkhead, and we did this by marking what needed to be done then pulling the panel away slightly and filing a notch out. But (Murphies first law, if it doesn't need doing you will have already done it and if it does you wont have done it when its needed) it turned out we didn't need one of the notches after all. I will cut a small filler and replace it.

We again used the straps to apply pressure for us rather than trying to push a panel under some decent loads into place and then hoping to screw it down. This way you get it into position, screw it down, then release the strap. Because we thought we might be applying a lot of load to get the panel down we even braced the hull at the bow against my work room with some timber, but I doubt that was necessary. As I said the panel went on relatively easily compared to some of the stories I have heard, and the hull panels seem very fair and only minor ups or downs where each panel meet and I think I will have little trouble getting them flush again. Just typing that is probably asking for trouble but it does look quite fair.

The next job is to unscrew the panels again half the boat at a time and starting at the bilge and working down (up the hull from the waterline) and gluing the panels to the bulkheads. Because the panels, especially the chamfer have remained attached to the hull for a while they will retain a memory of the shape they were cajoled into which will make it easier to re attach them alone. Then once all the panels are glued to the bulkheads I will start to fill the larger gaps with off-cuts of Duflex glued into the gap and the rest with glue to each other, then I will start to fill the gaps with filler so that I can start to shape the joins straight before applying the glass tape.

I have not taken enough intermediate photos as I would have liked but I think I have still managed to cover each task so that it could be vaguely understood so far. I should also tell you that there is something that pictures and words don't quite cover adequately. After finishing to this stage and seeing the first hull take the shape you can see is a very satisfying feeling, one of immense pride of accomplishment. Whilst it is a long way off being a boat, it really does now look like part of one and is very similar to what you will see from other builders. If you choose to build, from time to time you will feel hot, tired, itchy or sore but these feelings all pale into insignificance when stood next to the memory of simply sitting and admiring the work you have just completed. And that is the feeling at this early stage, imagine the feeling at the launch. Long after the boat is launched you will forget the hours spent doing this or that, or the weariness after a long hot day, or the momentary discomfort of itchiness, but the memory of your achievement is much harder to erase. You will most likely be sailing in it!

Jan 14 Gluing the panels down.

After a leisurely morning showing the boat (I am starting to refer to it as a boat now!) to some prospective boat builders in my area, I spent my Sunday afternoon unscrewing what I have called the bilgeboards from the bulkheads, from the mdf temps in the centre of the boat forward on each side of the hull, then wedging the panel away from the bulkheads and applying glue to the edges of the bulkheads and re screwing the panel down. Because of the other panels already screwed on (which is not what I would have done had I not been behind schedule for the chamfer work with Brett on Friday, I would normally attach and then glue them before the next panel below is in place) it is easier to apply the glue from the inside of the hull for most of the bulkheads. Either way it is an easy process.

I then repeat the process from the central mdf temp bulkhead back and the panels are glued.

I could have got a lot more done today but I have worked fairly hard at it the last few days so I have given myself permission to take it a bit easier for a while. I still managed to get both the bilgeboards glued today but if I had worked all day and a little faster I could probably have finished the next panels down as well. Today's work was fairly easy and unrushed and I enjoy it far more this way. The panels screw back on with very little effort now that they have sat in position for a day or 2. After the panels are screwed back down I then went around and smeared any glue that squeezed out of the join into a nice clean line with my finger and removed any excess and also added some here and there where the glue line was a little thin.

You can see from the last 2 pictures, some of the repair work needed because of the kit cut errors in the cad drawings. The edge of bulkhead 3 at the chamfer panel is a little out and the panel will not curve this far. It needs a piece about a meter long added starting at 0 and out to around 15mm then tapering back to nothing. And the part removed from the chamfer at the top (bottom actually but the hull is upside down) is almost identical in size and shape to the piece that needs to be added at the bottom (top where the deck turn starts) and I will add this when I strip plank the deck turn.

Jan 19 Still gluing the panels down.

Over the last couple of days I have managed a couple of hours here and there. I have glassed the inside of the last panel that I didn't get to do last week because of the rush to get the panels on yada, yada, but I now have them done.

I have glued all of the panels (except the chamfer) to the bulkheads with the help of a new friend. Lauren is a 17 year old girl that wants to be a boat-builder as her profession. Her father Brian delivered some stock to our business, saw what I was doing in the warehouse (besides running a business) and noted that his daughter was interested in boat building and would I mind if he bought her along for a look. She asked if she could help here and there to get some experience and I gladly agreed. She is very helpful and keen to learn (she can fit in between bulkhead 0 & 1 to glue from the inside that I had no hope of doing!), I cant teach her much as I am no more experienced than she is, but at least she gets some experience on some aspects of the materials used. If there is anyone reading this that has a boat building business and is looking for an apprentice, I can thoroughly recommend Lauren to you. Send us an email and I will pass on the details.

There are no new photos as a glued panel does not look any different to a screwed down panel but I will soon start to fair the panels before gluing them to each other (fill the horizontal gaps in the hull) and will take some close ups of how the panels can be coerced into laying level and flat with each other. And then there will be the filleting coving before I apply the boat length layers of glass that seal and reinforce the hull inside and out.

Jan 20 Just half the chamfer to glue

I only got a little done today, I have now glued all the panels including the rear half of the chamfer and also started filling some of the larger gaps with strips cut from off-cut Duflex. I will hopefully get the front of the chamfer glued tomorrow. It is a big job but I am hoping that when I let the screws off and the panel springs out, it will retain some of its memory of the bend and the stress to get it back down and screwed again wont be as great as the effort to get it down the first time. Nevertheless I will have the clamps and ratchet straps ready to replicate what Brett and I did first time around. 

I recommend you purchase one of the cheap work bench clamps. They are only around $20 and have the ability to clamp odd shapes which as you can see helps when clamping off cuts. You can see the mark for cutting (with a jigsaw) this fill strip. This is intended for the gap between bulkhead 3 and chamfer which I will add when I glue the chamfer tomorrow. I have already mad a strip for the small gap at the stern at the chamfer (middle pic) and will need to make a long strip for the keel (last pic taken before I added the rest of the hull planks). You can see the length of the gap (about 6mt) in one of the overhead shots of the hull with the panels on. If I have no trouble getting the chamfer finished tomorrow I will set about filling the keel and then I can start on filling the rest of the hull and removing screws and filling the holes.

Jan 21 All hull panels now glued to bulkheads

Brett mentioned that the chamfer panel, when unscrewed would retain a memory of the shape it needed to bend back to and I was relieved to find out today that as predicted, the chamfer panel screwed back into place (at bulkhead 0) after I had put glue on the bulkheads, a lot easier than it did when originally screwed down into place. Brett and I took over half an hour with various clamps and straps and really had to exert some pressure, and whilst it still took some pushing and clamping and straps I managed to get it back into place in about 5 minutes. Which is a good thing, for obvious reasons but also because it was a hot day and the glue was going off fairly fast. On the way to bulkhead 0 I had to fill the gap whilst gluing down to bulkhead 3. It was fairly easy to fill with the strip I had cut, and the rest of the gap I filled with glue. I also filled the notch that I didn't need to cut, that took less than a minute. It took longer to cut the piece out than it did to fill it.

 

So tomorrow I will start to remove all the screws but I will add tabs here and there to make the panels meet evenly along the length of the hull (I have already done some where the unevenness was close to a bulkhead), some will need to be pulled up others pushed down to meet the other panel or a combination of both depending on the lay so that it is as fair as I can get it before I glue the panels to each other and fill the gaps. This will result in less bog needed later.

As I have shown some "fixing" jobs of gaps and mistakes etc, I should add that whilst here and there I have mentioned that there are gaps in panels and there are some minor errors in the kit and I have also mentioned that whilst I have been as careful as I can about the measurements of the bulkhead placement etc, the material and methods are forgiving enough that in many ways close enough is good enough. The closer to accurate you can get things to be the less work there is later to correct it, such as the tabs I will do tomorrow. I can skip this task but it will mean more bog later if I want the boat to look good, which then needs to be sanded and besides being more work, more bog is also more weight. Having said all that, there are times when your best is going to be good enough and obsessing about being exact to the micro-millimetre isn't necessary and neither is worrying about it.

Jan 22 Fairing tabs attached to outboard side of hull

An easy afternoon (its still hot, not as hot as it is for Tom on Scrumble in Darwin! but hot nonetheless) only did 3 hours work and only trimmed the panels to each other on the outboard side of the hull. I think it looks quite fair, there are some panels very near to bulkheads that could not be moved and will have to be bogged to level but otherwise it looks ok, especially the panel join down the middle of hull on the outboard side that will be most visible. The rest on the outboard side are mostly under the waterline. I haven't done the inboard side yet but it looks pretty good too, and as it is under the bridgedeck is not going to be as visible. I have still taken care on the under waterline joins (as I will be on the under bridgedeck joins) as I want to be confident that if it is inspected out of the water it will not look like I have hidden defects.

I will do the inboard side of the hull tomorrow before heading off to Melbourne for a few days on business. Then when I return later in the week I will start to glue and fill the hull panels together. Then I will try to put the wombat wet out machine together so that I can start to apply the glass to the hull.

Jan 23 Hull ready for final glue and fill

Another easy day. I managed to get all of the trimming tabs onto the inboard side of the hull and started to mask some of the bigger gaps. I have just taped the inside of some of the joins with packing tape to stop the glue from oozing out the other side when I trowel it into the gaps. I could put the tape on either side of the hull but I figure it will be easier to sand the outside of the hull rather than the inside.

I found I needed a few more tabs on the bow of the inboard side than I did on the outboard side but then the curves are a little more complex so that probably stands to reason. I also had found it was a little naturally fairer in parts so it evened out in the end. I am pretty happy with the hull and it feels like the actual fairing may not be as bad as I have built it up in my mind to be. We will see. I hope I am not disappointed.

I wont be able to work on the boat until the weekend now. Next task is the actual gluing and filling. The method will be to have 2 pots, one with resin and hardener mix in it with which I will coat the joins and then the other pot will have filler, which is resin, hardener and the microsperes (411) powder added. The filler will be made thickish so it doesn't run too much and will be packed into the joins to the tape at the back and smoothed over at the front of each join. The microsphere mix has about the same consistency as the balsa when set so will mean that when it is glassed there will be no difference in the density of the core.

Jan 27 Filling of hull joins started

Back on the boat today and I managed to get a fair bit done. First of all I remembered something I had read a few times on other builders sites, that is not to get lazy because the end result is in direct proportion to the work put in on the little things. Whilst I was away I wondered whether I had cut some corners on the tabbing on the under bridgedeck so the first thing I did today was to double check my work, and whilst I doubt it made any difference, I added some more tabs just to be absolutely sure that I have done a thorough job.

Then I started on the filling. This is a tricky job. I finished masking the inside of all of the larger gaps so that the filler/glue would not just push out the other side and run everywhere. I then started mixing some filler and resin/hardener mix in one pot and some resin/hardener in another. The theory being that I would paint the joins with the resin/hardener first. Then I would go along with the filler and fill the joins with the other. The first lesson here is that different substances mix differently. What I mean is I remembered the ratio of resin/hardener to powder when mixing the glue using 403 but with the filler powder 411 it doesn't dissolve in the way the 403 seems to do, it really adds to the volume of the liquid far more. So I did the mix the way I did with glue and pumped 5 pumps of each thinking I would need that much to get as far as I had wet out with the resin/hardener (and would have been the correct amount if I were mixing glue) and I ended up with a very large pot of filler that went off about half way through using it all. It got extremely hot, so hot it started to smoke, and that is not an exaggeration. Its a shame I couldn't get a photo of it, but I was all gloved up and didn't have time to stop. I thought it would spontaneously combust so I filled the pot with water.

So I quickly mixed up another smaller batch and got to work finishing as far as I had wet out. There is another tip here, as this is a new task with materials I haven't used before you should always start with a small area and get used to the materials. It takes a few pots of filler before you start to get it to the correct consistency. Too runny and you cant build it up at all, it just runs all over the place and seeps away into the join leaving a shallow trough at the surface, too thick you cant get it deep into each join and it goes off much faster. One final thing about mixing the filler, the powder is so fine it is almost already a liquid. Anyone who has ever seen graphite powder will understand how fine it is, and when mixing it is almost like mixing 2 different liquids, except as the resin gets hold of the powder it gets gluggy, lumpy and uneven then you smooth it out into the paste and then add more powder to get it thicker as needed.

In the end I found a great compromise method that seems to work. I fill in 2 goes, the first runny enough to get into the join easily and I didn't bother trying to build the filler higher than the panels in this go. I make the first mix about the consistency of toothpaste, anyone who has ever done any plastering, it is about the same as the filler for that, then after that filler has started to go tacky (about 15 minutes which is about the time it takes to finish the row so I go back to the start of it for the second pass) I make a thicker mix about the consistency of putty and go over the joins again, building them up higher with what looks like a bead over the join and building it up into a mound over each side and smoothing back down to nothing. The reason for this is so that when I sand it back I will be left with no areas where there is no filler. That way I will end up with a fair and smoothly rounded join all around for the fibreglass to sit smoothly onto. This is important not only so the fibreglass has a good surface to bond to (fibreglass shouldn't be bonded to sharp corners as it will form a weak point at the turn, rather it should have gentle curves which spreads out the load on it) but will also mean that the fibreglass sets fair so that less bog and sanding is needed later to get a smooth, shiny, nice looking boat.

Just one other small tip about getting the resin/hardener into the joins without it running everywhere, it seems more effective to run your brush over the join up and down so that each lip catches the brush forcing resin into the join. If you try going along the join first you get lots of runs down the panels. Then once the join is wet you can spread the resin inside the join by going along the join with your brush. Be sure to get the filler into the join whilst the resin is still wet or tacky. If it dries you don't get a chemical bond. The idea of the resin wet-out is that it seeps into the pores of the balsa better, making a deeper stronger bond with it than just the thick filler which really only bonds with the surface, but when you lay filler onto the wet resin it chemically bonds.

Tomorrow will be more of the same, as I have only managed about 15% of the filling in the first hull. I am sure I will get faster at it as I was on a bit of a learning curve today. Then I will remove the tabs and screws and fill in the areas behind them and all the holes, then do the same from the inside until the whole hull is filled ready for the glassing. I think this process could take a week or so.

Jan 28 Filling of hull joins continues

I didn't get much done today, I started late and finished early! I did get the rest of the outboard joins of the port hull filled, including removing the fairing tabs and filling the voids left behind them. 

Well almost, I still have a few tabs to remove and also the join to the keel panels to fill but I also have a big gap down the middle of the keel panels to fill also which I am leaving until last. So I am not even at half way really! Normally a hull would have 6 joins to fill, I have 7 when you include the one down the middle of the keel. I have now filled 2 of them so I am about a third of the way through.

But I did learn something today. I used way too much filler yesterday. I overfilled in the belief that I needed to build the filler over the edges of the joins so that I could sand it back to a nice round join. That is still true, however, I overdid it, and I can still achieve the same result using far less filler and effort.

I found that even when over filled you could still get valleys (low spots) that need extra filling so if you have to fill again anyway, you may as well do it without the extra sanding that is required when you overfill. For example, I had as much as 2mm of overfill in some places but you sand it all away to less than 1/4mm to 1/2mm and in places I still had areas that were lower than the rest of the join requiring another fill. A lot of hard work and a lot of wasted filler and I would have had the same result using a lot less work and material if I just fill to flush in future and fill the low spots later. The only places where it is ok to have more filler is where you have uneven panels that need the filler to level them out.

Ironically, the dust that is created when you sand the stuff off again is almost identical to the powder used to make it! I sanded a section first up today so that I could find out how easy it was to sand back and to see if overfilling was the way to go. Sanding is not a pleasant task. All of the stories you have heard about sanding and fairing are true! I know this from sanding just a 1mt filled join. It is hard work and anything you can do to minimise this is a good thing! It's funny, you hear other builders go on about less is better to minimise weight. Listen to them. If weight doesn't motivate you, use cost, or use workload. Less weight, less waste, less work, it all means the same thing. I spent a half hour or so rigging up the vacuum cleaner to the orbital sander which removed about half the dust. The rest made sure it hung in the air a while (I was wearing a mask!) so that it could permeate through my clothing. I was using an orbital most of the time so I just had to apply the downward pressure and believe me it is still hard work. I also used a sanding board I have made at about 40mm. Also hard work. I cant wait to start fairing! Yeah right!

The sequence of pictures below show that using less filler makes no difference to the end result except you use less filling materials and you do less work to get it back to where it would have been anyway.

So the plan from here is to use as little filler as I can. If I get any areas that are too low I will fill them again after I have sanded back the little that I do overfill.

Tomorrow I will start on the inboard side of the hull (after I remove the few remaining fairing tabs and fill behind them). Then I will start to work on the keel.

Jan 29 Still filling the hull joins

I had some help today from Jo and her wealth of boatbuilding experience. She doesn't actually have any but from the quality of her work you would swear that she does. We filled the chamfer panel gap together and it is a good thing I had her help because it is a 2 person job. Well actually the whole boat is a 2 person job, but I am not complaining..... whilst one of us (mostly Jo) trowelled the glue into the small gap on the outside of the hull the other smoothed it along the join from the inside of the hull. The glue is actually under the clear tape that we put up to stop the glue from just dropping to the floor.

There is quite a big gap from the edge of each panel on the inside of the hull (around 20mm) so in effect the clear tape is creating a triangular shape with the tape forming 1 of 3 sides of the triangle, the edge of each panel the other 2 sides, and filling from the top. Being such a big gap means that quite a lot of filler is needed to fill it and it gets quite hot as it sets.

In some places where the panels meet quite tightly on the outside I filled the gap from the inside. This required a thicker mix of filler to stop it running out, and in some places I placed some clear tape, removed some, filled and then replaced the tape to keep the glue in place.

So that is now 3 of 7 joins filled. It seems that 3 hours per hull join is the time it takes and I am getting about 3 - 4 hours work in each day. So later this week I should have them all done although the join of the keel to the bilge panels should fill a bit faster and I could get them both done in a day, the gap down the middle of the keel panels will take a lot longer, because I am going to try to fill that with a strip of Duflex first and it will need to be cut and glued in place. I am not certain how I am going to do this yet, as I don't have scaffolding to get me up that high, and I am not sure it the structure is strong enough for me to be climbing onto. I will have to give it some thought.

We worked for 3 hours today but there were 2 of us so I have added 6 hours to the total. Writing that I only worked on the boat for 3 hours on a Sunday makes me feel a little guilty that I am not putting in longer hours. (Some work days I only put in 3 hours but that seems reasonable considering I also have to work at my living during the day also). We got there around lunch or just after today and worked until around 4 when I decided I had had enough for the day and I went swimming to cool down again and remove the itchiness from the glass. It is a bit of a routine lately. Its summer and hot and it is supposed to be fun, so I guess in the end only I can decide what is enough. I have read that it takes a huge part of your life to build a cat but I don't want to lose a whole section of life now so I can live a little later. If it takes a bit longer, it takes a bit longer. It is still great fun and I get to do other fun stuff too.

Jan 30 Filling the rest of the hull joins

I got some great advise today from another boat builder that I have mentioned on site. Judy from Scrumble had seen on the site what I am doing and had a great method for applying the filler to the joins. On Scrumble they used snap seal lunch bags as piping bags. I fold a lunch bag over a clean mixing pot and push the snap-seal out of the way. I then fill the bag with the filler and then snap it shut. Then remove the air bubbles, push the filler into a corner of the bag, then snip the corner off to the size required and go and squeeze the filler into the hull join. It's great because it is fast and clean. Once it is in the bag, the filler only comes out of the corner as you squeeze and goes into the gaps that you otherwise have to try to trowel into. I then just went over any area I had over to under filled and smoothed it out a little with the spatula. I have pictures of each step in the link in the picture below that show the simple process or you can see Scrumble's excellent pictures on their website at this page on their site: http://www.scrumble.com.au/bilge-exterior-fillets-port-hull/

  

Using this new and much cleaner and more effective filling method I managed to fill the equivalent of a whole join in around 2 hours (they were taking me 3) and I am sure I will get faster as I spent a lot of time experimenting with filler thickness. I will definitely finish the rest of the hull tomorrow with the exception of the keel gap.

At one section at the bow, the join was too good. It was so tight that you could not get any glue or filler in between the panels. The join will be covered with fibreglass both sides so it isn't critical but I decided I would rather they were glued to each other also. So I ran a jigsaw down the join to open it up a little so that I could get resin/hardener in, and I then tried to squeeze a little filler into the join using the spatula. 

Rather than do one whole length join I decided to fill the 2 joins left (keel to bilge, bilge to chamfer) as I went. The benefit is I only have to climb the ladder half as many times. So I managed to fill both joins to the middle of the boat before I had had enough for the day and tomorrow I will fill the rest of the hull. Then I will attack the keel gap.

Time Spent: 85.00 Hours

Total build time so far: 220.00 Hours   Total Elapsed Time: 4 Months, 4 weeks

February 2006 logs