2006 building logs

Nov 2006 Finishing and turning the starboard hull

The Starboard hull is almost complete, with just the internal tapes to go before I turn it. Once it is turned I will start on a lot of the little jobs that are time consuming and fiddly as I will be ready to join the 2 finished hulls but wont be able to until I move to another place where I can remove the boat once it is joined. I have plenty of work that can be done where I am until then, all these jobs must be done sooner or later anyway so it wont push the launch date back at all.

2nd Nov 2006 Final sanding

It took me about 2 hours to give the third and final coat of highbuild a light sand. I have just to sand the rounded chamfer turn. In order to sand the chine straight on the outboard side, I measured and marked a level straight line 10mm below the correct position of the chine and then marked another line 10mm above it. This created a railroad track with the chine meandering up and down by a few mm either way along the length. I then sanded the point of the chine down and bias up or down depending on where the chine sat in relation to the lines. This centered the chine and rounded it which further lessened the visibility of any discrepancy making the chine look straight.

I then washed the hull and marked the waterline. I used the 2000mm measurement above the top face of the strongback on the outboard side where I could take a measurement. On the inboard side it is not possible to do this, so I ran a stringline and measured from the middle of the chine turn to match the other hull to be sure but the stringline was in the correct position. Then using the waterline marks as the start point I used the spirit level, which is 60mm wide, to mark a line above the waterline (below the line on the upturned hull) to mark my mask line to where the copper epoxy will cover. Some people advocate a little more (say 100mm) some less, so I settled on 60mm because of the ease of marking the width of the level, using the level to ensure the line was level at the same time.

Once the mask line was marked it was then an easy task to run masking tape along the lines, to which I could attach the skirts to catch any drips of copper epoxy onto the sanded areas so that I don't have to sand them off again.

3rd Nov 2006 Applying copper epoxy anti foul

I had another of those long days punctuated by 3 hours waiting for paint to dry. So while I was on site for 9 hours, only 6 were spent actually working. Again I could have been doing things while I waited for the first copper epoxy resin coat to dry enough to apply the second coat but I had other things I could do, like relax and read the paper, do a little computer work online as well as surf the net a bit.

First thing I did was attach the skirt. I re used the plastic from the highbuild coats, which I re used from the last hull. So for $13 of plastic sheet I got both hulls finished. That's pretty good value.

With the skirts on I was ready to apply the first coat of copper epoxy. For those that have recently started reading, I plan to coat the bottom of the hulls with PureSeal over the top of copper epoxy resin as a second line of defence that hopefully means a minimal amount of maintenance and I don't have to replace the coat for 10 years. On the first hull I used 1.5kgs of resin and 1.5kgs of copper powder (50:50 mix) on the first coat, so I measured out 3 tubs of 500g of copper powder. 10 pumps of the west wall pump is 490g of epoxy. For the second coat I used 2.5kgs of resin and 1.5kgs of resin (67:33 mix) made up of 2 lots of 1kgs and 1 lot of 500g.

So in all I used 8kgs of copper powder (4 on each hull) and 6kgs of extra resin (3 on each hull) and I have 1 kgs of copper powder left over, for use on the rudders, daggerboards and inside the casing and any touching up I might need to do.

4th Nov 2006 Chocolate coated bum

I pumped 10 pumps of resin directly into the roller tray and mixed it with the drill and mixer attachment. After about a minute of mixing I poured in 500g of copper powder and mixed for another minute before rolling it onto the hull. On the port hull I used a medium pile roller for the first coat and a fine foam roller for the second coat. I used foam rollers on both coats on the starboard hull and in retrospect using the medium pile roller was a better choice for the first coat. The reason is that there are still pinholes here and there in the sanded finish of the highbuild and the coarser roller more effectively filled these pinholes. I left a coarser finish that was somewhat reduced by the fine rolled second coat. The fine roller on both coats has left a smoother finish but has left a few pinholes that I have to now touch up. I am not too concerned as there is another coat of antifoul going on that will fill these but if I were leaving it at this stage I might be concerned enough to give it another coat.

 

One of the things that the copper epoxy coat does is that whilst it is wet it is glossy and because it is a dark color it highlights any discrepancy in the fairness of the finish. But this is only of benefit if you have done a good job because there is a lot of work to fix it now that the copper coat is on. It would involve a lot of sanding to remove the coat, re bogging, re sanding to fair and then re applying the copper coat. This area is underwater so I doubt you would go to this extreme even if the finish was very poor. Fortunately I have done a reasonable job of fairing and I am happy with it.

I waited 3 hours before starting the second coat. The first coat was still very tacky, if I touched it I left my finger prints. It is always a difficult question of how long to wait to apply the next coat. If the resin is set the bond is no longer going to be a chemical one and without sanding not a very good mechanical one either. In the summer months half an hour to an hour after the first coat would be fine. Whilst there have been some summer like days it is still spring weather and today was only about 20c. My concern was that perhaps the thick copper rich coat would be too difficult to apply onto a still tacky surface. There is no technical issue in applying the second coat before the first is sufficiently dry except it is hard to apply as the roller tends to stick. This was not a problem so the first coat was sufficiently dry or the second sufficiently wet to roll on easily.

As per the first hull I used 2 lots of 10 pumps (490g) each with 1 kg of copper powder and I lot of 5 pumps with 500g copper so around 67% by volume and this was an almost exact amount to cover the entire underwater area plus just a little left over which I used to touch up the first hull in places I had scratched whilst rolling it over.

So with the second coat on, all I will do tomorrow is to remove the skirt and check the finish. I could start to remove the temp bulkheads, and get started on the internal tapes but I think I will have another lazy Sunday.

5th Nov 2006 A lazy Sunday

I had another of my lazy Sundays where I don't do much except watch tv. I did go and check on the cure of the copper epoxy coat and to remove the masking skirt. It is not completely set and whilst it is dry but a little soft, I can still leave a fingerprint. But other than that, the finish is fantastic. I am stoked.

I also found time to remove one of the temp bulkheads. I will remove the rest of them tomorrow, but on Tuesday Jo and I are going to Melbourne for a few days (not to go to the races) and I wont be back until next Monday or Tuesday and with the Muster the weekend after I probably wont have the internal tapes done until the weekend after that, getting into late November. Hopefully we can still turn the hull in November.

6th Nov 2006 Temps removed

I have removed the temporary bulkheads, although I am not quite finished with them yet. The curve shape of the hull to deck is made by strip planking cedar strips and I will need the temps of this section to create these curved panels. I will cut the un-needed sections of them out so they wont be quite as heavy and unwieldy as they are now.

With the temps removed you can see down the full length of the living area in the hull. In this hull the rear cabin is a berth and bulkhead 6 has a wider opening but it does not extend all the way to the floor (in the port hull the rear cabin is a bathroom and bulkhead 6 has a normal door).

So all that is left to be done is to tape all of the internal panel and bulkhead joins. Each section takes a few hours and there are 7 sections to do (I will do the last section in the bow later). Taping includes coving with filler and applying 2 tapes, a 150mm and a 100mm. I think it will take me about a week including 2 weekends at each end to finish them.

20th Nov 2006 Not much done for 2 weeks

I have not had much chance to do anything to the boat in the last 2 weeks. Jo and I were in Melbourne for a week and we got back Tuesday of last week, then on Friday through to Sunday we had the annual Schionning Muster. I would not miss the muster for anything. In fact I cant wait to attend a muster with our boat. For those that don't know, the muster is an annual event held by Schionning's to bring together current boat owners, past builders and their boats where possible and current and future builders and anyone generally interested in cats for a weekend of social racing and a dinner on Saturday night. It showcases the many variants of Schionning (and a few other designs) cats and is fantastic from both a motivational and informational point of view. You can compare the many ideas that builders have used and choose the ideas that you like and use them in your build. And not to mention just how much fun it is.

On Thursday we were visited by our new friends Geoff and Linda who are attending the muster to finalize their plans and kit to build a wilderness 1320. They came to see our hulls to get an idea of what building is like. I hope I was able to shed some light on the process and that they start soon on the adventure of their lives. Good luck with it, I am sure you wont regret it.

On the Friday we had the chance to board about 7 different boats of varying size and to inspect the boats at the marina (at Lemon Tree Passage). During the day Brett Schionning also did a demonstration of boat building techniques and general information of the material by making part of a daggerboard case. There was also the opportunity to talk with reps from some of the equipment and material suppliers.

On Saturday morning and Saturday afternoon there were 2 races. Such was the popularity of the weekend that there were too many people and not enough crew berths so Jo and I had to sit out the morning race. The winds were light but picked up in the afternoon. For the afternoon race Jo and I got to go on Wandera, a Schionning Cosmos 1250S built to NSW Survey and about to go into service as a charter cat, and an absolutely incredible boat. The work and expertise in building is clearly evident and I doubt you will ever see a better cat, anywhere. The boat will be available for Charter out of Bateman's Bay NSW with John Owens the owner skipper, and I thoroughly recommend anyone to check this boat out.

So impressed were we with Wandera that we asked and were allowed to sail in her again for the Sunday race. Whilst it may have been a good idea to see how another boat sailed, we were just so impressed with the boat and with John Owens, the owner, that we just had to sail on her again. Besides, being a 1250 she is only 200mm longer than our boat so it made sense to stay on a boat that would be most representative of our boat, although I doubt I will be able to finish our boat as well as John has his. You will soon be able to see Wandera on Johns website www.baysail.com.au and sail on her by charter. Thanks again John, we hope to sail with you again on Wandera very soon and hope you have heaps of success with your new business.

The above pic is of the Saturday morning race start. The boat on the right is a Wilderness 1480 kit cat and has the same hull shape (albeit 2 meters longer) as ours and if you zoom in you can see the hard hull chines. You can compare this to the boat in the foreground on the left. This is a round bilge strip planked 1480 Schionning cat (I think it is a Waterline but it could be a Cosmos). There isn't much in it and the designs both look very impressive. And just to put paid to any thoughts that a round bilge cat out sails a hard chine cat, Le Tigre (the boat on the right) was by far the fastest cat and was only just piped by a trimaran helmed by a champion sailor (Daniel Van Kerckhoff from the design office). Although I wasn't on board this year (I got to sail on her at last years muster) I am told she consistently hits 20 knots.

On the Saturday night there was a lovely casual dinner (spit roast), a band and some presentations. Very unexpected to us, the team at Schionning awarded Jo and I a prize for having this website. I was so overwhelmed that I actually sang the mahnamahna theme in front of about 100 people! Lets just hope a video of this does not materialize! I even surprised Jo as this is quite out of character for me. The reward consisted of some through hull transducers for speed (through the water) and water temp and depth sounding transducer. Perfect for us as we are just starting to shop for such things. I cant thank Schionning's enough for their generosity. I will report on these items as I fit them to the hull.

So to today. I intended to get started on the taping but unfortunately I must have got some heat stroke from the sun on the weekend and around lunchtime I started feeling a bit under the weather with a headache and mild nausea so Jo insisted I go home and lie down, which I did. But before I went home I had to do a little repair work on the wombat so that I can be ready to glass on the weekend (I have more business trips for the rest of the week). To explain, when we glassed the hull we used the wombat to wet the 12mt tapes out and we were a little messy as we were working fast to get the whole hull done and were so tired at the end of the day we forgot to clean the wombat and we resined the bottom pvc tube to the axle. It set so hard I snapped the crank handle trying to free it up. In the end I had to take the wombat apart to free the bottom roller and then had to cut the pvc tube away from the aluminum axle. I used the circular saw set to about 1mm and scored it almost through and then ran a chisel down the groove to finally cut the tube away.

This was a careless mistake but in the end will only cost a 600mm pvc tube, less than $10 to fix, so no big deal, but it pays to be careful and to clean everything after use.

So on the weekend I will be back into the building, super motivated to get on with it if I wasn't before. If you are building and getting a bit tired of it and want to give yourself a boost, get onto a finished cat. You are sure to get back to it with renewed vigor.

My thanks again to the team at Schionning's and to everyone that had such kind things to say to us at the muster, many of whom we didn't know but who knew us from the website, and to the many new friends we made at the muster, new builders that will no doubt finish ahead of us and existing owners, in particular John Owens for their incredible generosity of spirit in letting us sail with them. I cant wait to return the favor.

25th Nov 2006 First internal tapes

Have you ever done aerobics in a sauna? That is what it feels like taping a hull join up a ladder, overhead in an upturned hull. The hull traps the rising heat and acts like a sauna and it is very hot. Much hotter than the prevailing temperature outside. Yesterday was a warm day but I wouldn't call it hot. It got to 29c. But inside the hull up the ladder it felt like double that. I may even have to resort to wearing a headband! Pat Cash and Mark Knoppfler have permanently scarred my impression of head bands but I may have to battle through that because the alternative is having sweat drip into my eyes which just adds to the difficulty of the job.

I also again misjudged how much the heat slows down some aspects of boatbuilding whilst ironically speeding others up causing the slower workrate. I intended to use the wombat to wet the tapes out and figured it would be much faster and I might get half the hull plank joins taped in one day. To recap, I am taping all of the hull plank tapes on the inside of the finished hull first then I will tape the bulkheads to the hull. I figured out that 10 turns of the wombat handle wets out 200mm of tape, which is fine for 2 of the 3 long sections (about half the hull) and it was my intention to get them done in one day. I loaded the tapes onto the wombat ready to start, and mixed up some filler to cove the joins with the intention of applying the tapes onto wet coving

I also decided I would try using peel ply on the tape joins so that I would not have to sand them later. I didn't bother on the first hull, and I don't really need to bother on this one, because I don't intend to fair the inside of the boat. I am going to try using laminex instead of bog, sanding and fairing and paint. The only reason I would sand the tapes is to remove the jagged edges that catch on clothing or worse skin until I apply the laminex nearer the end of the build. So before I started wetting out the tapes I cut 2000mm of peel ply off the roll and cut that piece into 200mm wide strips and rolled them up ready to apply. One point on cutting peel ply is that it is really easy to snag threads and cause bunches which must be removed before applying the ply as it must be smooth to apply it properly. They come out easily enough but are annoying all the same.

The last time I did this in winter it took all day for the coves to set hard but today it took minutes, about 30, rather than hours to set hard whilst I was cutting the peel ply!. I mixed up 10 pumps of resin which in retrospect was way too much. I poured it into the wombat and cranked through 10 turns wetting out the first 150mm tape, I then cut it and wound on another 10 turns of tape and could feel the tape getting hot already after only about 5 minutes so I decided to go and apply the tapes to the hull, which I did. I returned to the wombat and managed to wet out a third tape, which I also immediately applied to the hull. By the time I returned to the wombat the rest of the resin in the bag had started hardening and got so hot it melted the bag.

So as a result of the wombat fiasco I decided that I would revert to the manual wet out method. For those that don't remember, the manual method of wetting out the tapes is simply to lay them out (I use an offcut of Duflex) and paint them with resin then roll them up and unroll them on the panel.

Once I had both tapes on a join I applied the peel ply. A tip here, once you have applied the peel ply and have it on pretty well, quit while you are ahead. Any attempt at a better job often results in making it worse. Especially if you have resin coated gloves which is almost always the case as you use your hands to smooth the glass down. The sticky gloves stick really well to the peel ply making it almost impossible to re apply peel ply once it has been applied. You lift it up unintentionally due to the sticky gloves and wish you hadn't messed with it and infuriatingly you cant get any improvement on the last touch with each touch worse than the once before.

I was even wondering today if I would have been better off taping in the cooler weather last month and sanding in this heat. Can you believe it, contemplating sanding in the hotter weather as better than taping in it! So it tool me 6 hours today to do what I thought was 3 hours work. I intended to work 6 hours but I only got half as much done as I thought I would. And the heat meant I needed to work faster than I wanted to so I took quite a few rests to watch the test match cricket.

26th Nov 2006 More internal tapes

It was a little cooler today but it is still very hot inside the upturned hull. I decided to get better organized today. I did away with the ladder and put 2 44gallon drums inside with a plank, that way I could tape the whole length by walking along the plank. I got away with the ladder yesterday because the gap is only 2000mm and I could step on the doorway of the bulkhead and the back of the ladder on one side and the rungs of the ladder on the other and manage to roll the tape out with a bit of a stretch but this one is 2700mm. You cant let go of a tape half way or the whole thing just peels back and falls so you have to get it up in one go. So I had no choice anyway.

I managed in 4 hours to do what it took me 6 hours to do yesterday. I decided that I would only peel ply the top 2 joins (bottom on the upside down hull) as the rest end up under the sole anyway. I also had a much better appreciation of how fast the filler would go off, but that still didn't stop mixing more than I could apply before it set hard in the tub as I was applying it! I mixed up enough for 4 joins and managed to get 3 done before the stuff started really heating up and hardening. I mixed up another small pot, finished the 4th join and repaired the 3rd that was not well applied due to the fill hardening, the first 2 were fine. I am much slower working upside down in the heat. The bottom 2 chines were already filled and I had also sanded them smooth ready to tape.

Anyway I got them all done and started on the glassing. I had pre cut the 12 tapes (6 150mm, 6 100mm) so I started wetting them out with the paint brush and applying them. I got the top 2 150mm tapes on first, then put the 100mm on top of them, then did the next 2 150mm and so on until I had done all 6 joins. I then peel plied the last 2 and that was it for the day. The cricket was calling, and I was a little fatigued by the heat of yesterday and today inside the hull.

 

One final tip. I find that if I wear latex gloves for any length of time my hands turn into prunes from the sweat. I decided to try wearing a pair of cotton gloves inside the latex gloves. The result is much better. The cotton gloves absorb a lot of the sweat so you still end up with a little moisture but nowhere near as much.

So I have about half the hull joins taped, then I can do the bulkhead joins. So I figure I still have a couple of weekends work to finish this hull. With Muster weekend and Melbourne trips I have only managed a pitiful amount of hours this month.

27th Nov 2006 Even more internal tapes

On Saturday in the heat it took 6 hours to finish 1 section, (6 hull panel tapes), yesterday in cooler conditions it took 4 hours and today in even cooler conditions it took 3 hours. All 3 were larger panel sections between the main 4 bulkhead, 4, 5, 6 & 7. Some of the improvement in time comes from getting better at it. Even though I did this only a few months ago it can take a while to get back into the swing.

So now I have just 2 small sections at the stern and 3 small sections at the bow. I figure I can finish these this week and next weekend I will get started on the 15 bulkhead to hull coves and tapes. These are a little trickier and take a little longer, maybe I can do 3 or 4 a day on the weekend and one or 2 each evening so that by the end of next week I will have finished this hull.

One thing I noted today. I did some coves with some left over filler that I intend to sand smooth before applying tapes later. After more than 2 hours they still hadn't fully set and I could still put an indentation with my finger in them. On Saturday afternoon some coves that I had done that I intended to apply glass on wet on wet set before I was able to put the glass on after only 20 minutes. The difference in temperature was not dramatic. It was probably 22 today and it was 29 on Saturday. Such a small temperature variance can make such a big difference. The variance is not in proportion to the time difference. 22 to 29 is a difference of about 1.32x but 20 minutes to 2 hours is about 5.5x. That's the exothermic effect I guess. Go figure.

28th Nov 2006 Still more internal tapes

I only had time to do an hours work on the hull today but I still managed to get an internal section of hull taped. The most forward living space in the Starboard hull, is the ensuite bathroom between bulkhead 3 and 4 and is about 1 meter in length. It is still 6 joins, so 12 tapes and they all need coving first, although the chamfer chine is partially already filled and sanded on the hull. But being only a meter long, I managed to get them done in an hour.

It was another very hot day today (35c) and I had to work fast with the coving filler which partially explains how I was able to get done so fast. I was glad to knock off early and go for a swim.

Now there are 4 sections to go and each is about a meter or less so I figure on 4 hours or less to get these done, then it is on to the more difficult bulkhead coves.

30th Nov 2006 Nearly all hull tapes done

I have managed to tape the 2 of the last 3 sets of hull panels, the ones between bulkheads 7 and 8 and 2 and 3 leaving only the joins between 1 and 2 to do. There will also be one more tape to do in between bulkhead 0 and 1, I was doing them as I attached the panels but I couldn't do the last one after attaching the chamfer panel.

I have only managed a fairly poor 30 hours this month due to the muster and also work commitments. I am not too concerned as last month I managed 80 hours and I have planned to average about 60 to 70 hours a month.

Time spent: 30 hours

Total build time so far: 710.00 Hours   Total Elapsed Time: 14 Months

December 2006 logs