The Hardest Working Tool in Boatbuilding

10/90

There is no doubt that on my project it is my smallest hand plane, an old nondescript piece of metal that I inherited from my Dad and I suspect he got it from his Dad as well. I removed a ton of material with it today to make the bilge panels fit. The first panel was worse so I suspect that my boat is a bit out of “Square” as the bilge panels were twins of one another….or the bottom was not quite symmetrical although I spent a lot of time trying to make it the same on both sides.

Oh well, it’s a done deal now.

I had a long day today and got a lot done. I planed the edges of both bilge panels, tied them to the other panels and bottom, taped the inside of the joints in preparation for filling them with thickened epoxy and finally, put some epoxy on the bow joint to tack it together.

That doesn’t sound like much but I am beat…planing is a heck of a workout but I crawled under the boat dozens of times to pass each tie back through to the top and to tape the inside of the joints. I made a ton of sawdust and shavings today….

It was interesting how the bilge panels went together….at first I though I was going to have to cut some plywood scraps to fill the gaps at the back where the bilge panels meet the side panels. But, as I slowly worked away, removing material with the plane, the panels came to fit quite nicely. They meet the bottom and side panels quite nicely as well. I had one place where the bilge panel wanted to intrude into the interior too much and I puzzled over how to fix that for a long time. Eventually, I used a piece of scrap and a screw to pull the bilge panel up to where I wanted it…

I wound up the day by epoxying the bow where the bilge panels, bottom and side panels all come together…it’s quite a mess right now and I have to say that trying to do things in the front anchor well from under the boat is really difficult. That is going to be a messy compartment!.

Some other photos of the day….

I like the bilge panels in the next one … they look like tail fins

Bottom Up

2/80

I spent a couple of hours Friday night getting the bottom on the bulkheads, lining it up with the centre lines, drilling holes and tying it all together with plastic zip ties.

I also planed the mess on the stem … getting rid of a ton of thickened hardened epoxy and the extra bit of the side panels that protrudes past the stem. I do love handplanes!

I also used a cabinet scraper to get rid of some epoxy off the side panels and bulkhead framing. That is another great tool, one that I had never used before. Doesn’t get much simpler than a flat piece of steel!

Gravity Is My Friend

2/78

Am I EVER glad I e-mailed Chuck Leinweber to ask a few questions about how to proceed with epoxying the hull the day before yesterday. In his explanation I realized that he turned the hull upside down to put the bottom and bilge panels on. I swear that the plan instructions tell you the opposite. I asked Chuck a few more questions and decided that doing it his way made more sense as gravity would help fitting the bottom and bilge panels.

Unfortunately, I had just epoxied the rear bulkheads and transom to the sides. I was concerned that I might crack one or more of these joints turning the boat as it was pretty wobbly. Chuck gave me some suggestions and tonight I went out to try and turn it over. I had been thinking I would screw some plywood to the bottom to lock things in place but soon realized that wouldn’t work due to the fact I’d be trying to screw into the edge of 1/4′ plywood on all the bulkheads.

So, I screwed the plywood to the top of the bulkheads and it worked like a charm! I rolled it over and then lifted it up to put the front on a sawhorse. I eventually got it on three sawhorses.

I screwed a piece of scrap plywood to the top of the temporary form, making a “T”. I then screwed the arms of the T to the top of a sawhorse. I screwed blocks to the other two sawhorses to keep the boat from sliding off the sawhorses. It is pretty secure and I can move the bulkheads sideways if need be to align things.

After that was done, I had to lay the bilge panels and bottom on the hull to see what it looked like.

As you can see from the photos, gravity is definitely my friend….I can’t imagine what a hassle it would be to try and attach the bottom and bilge panels with the hull upright.

I am going to have some work to do removing some material from a couple of bulkheads and the bilge panels are too large in a lot of places…but that’s ok…it’s easier to remove plywood than add it.

So, next step is to screw the bottom to the temporary form and stem, make sure all the bulkheads are lined up how I want them and then wire the bottom to the transom and bulkheads…I’m actually going to use plastic ties but the idea is the same. Then, if all is well, it is time to fit the bilge panels and tie them to the transom, bulkheads, bottom and side panels. When that looks good, it is time to mix up some really thick epoxy and glue everything together!

May 12, 2008

2/76

Spent a couple of hours late in the evening epoxying bulkheads 11 & 13 and the transom to the side panels. I painted all the surfaces to be joined with unthickened epoxy and then mixed some wood flour and cabosil together with the remaining epoxy and laid the thickened goop onto the surfaces before screwing everything back together. Also used some thickened epoxy to fill the holes in the side panel near the stem where I drilled several times trying to line up the stem when I first screwed the sides to everything.

YeeHAAAA!!!!

About 74 hours total to this point in time….

Well, my little experiment was enough to make me abandon my plans to coat all surfaces with epoxy before assembly…or after assembly for that matter. Given my work schedule, kids’ activities, the cold weather and long cure times we have been having and my impatience….I just decided to forgo that concept. I am going to go the primer, undercoat, paint route after assembly.

So, tonight after work I screwed the side panels to the temporary form. After freezing our tails off at soccer - it honestly felt like it was going to snow - I came home and a neighbour helped me attach the bulkheads, stem and transom. Wow…it looks like a boat and not a pile of plywood stacked against the wall! I am revved!

Have a look!

May 8, 2008 Experiment

Last night I didn’t get in the garage until later in the evening. I have one side panel laid out and taped up for coating with epoxy. I looked at it and looked at it and couldn’t decide what to do. I didn’t have enough time left to try and put 2 coats of epoxy on as it was late, it was cool in the garage and the epoxy would cure slowly.

After much pacing and thinking I decided to do a little experiment. I mixed up 45 ml of epoxy and coated the front face of the front bulkhead…maybe 1 square foot of area. I also coated a little area on the side panel near the transom. With the epoxy left over I added wood flour and cabosil until I had what appeared to be the necessary consistency for a fillet. I taped two pieces of scrap together at what I guessed to be the angle the side and bilge panels will take to each other and then smeared the fillet onto the joint. I tried using a tennis ball to round it but the radius isn’t large enough as the fillet becomes very thin at the joint. So, I added more fillet material and found a plastic lid with a larger radius and tried that. It looked a bit better so I left it to cure overnight. It’s going to be a messy job working with this stuff!

Checked the surfaces before I went to bed and they were still too soft to recoat so I went to sleep. Woke up and checked first thing this morning and they weere cured pretty hard..not tacky at all so I will have to sand before recoating. The fillet seemed pretty firm but I’ll leave it for the rest of the day before I test it for strength…I want to see how strong some “spot welds” will be so that I can remove the wires without having to heat them up.

April 28 to May 6, 2008

6/68

Mostly sanding the last few days.

I cut some Douglas Fir to size for the transom framing and glued them to the transom using Titebond III. I figure I am going to tape and epoxy these joints so using Titebond shouldn’t hurt anything. It’s so much nicer to use it than epoxy. I have to admit I am dreading doing the major filleting, taping and glassing.

I did finish shaping the rudder to its outline shape - I haven’t done the rounding over of the leading and trailing edges - by creating a 9″ radius template to round over the top and one corner of the bottom of the rudder. I do love that router! Clouds of sawdust but it does such a great job…way better than cutting with the jigsaw…which I tried but the blade deflected badly….and then having to file, rasp and sand the 1″ thick blank to roundness. It was far easier to shape a 1/4″ piece of scrap, clamp it to the rudder blank and then use the router.

I also cut the rudder cheek to size and rounded off the corner using the rudder template.

So, all the major components are ready to assemble! I have been reading and re-reading the various arguments pro and con on using epoxy on all surfaces before painting vs. just using paint. I have decided to go the epoxy route. As it is easy to determine where to mask off areas on the side panels to leave as bare wood for the filleting/taping/joining bulkheads process I am going to proceed as follows:

1 - Mask off the side panels and put the epoxy coats on the unmasked areas before assembly so that I can do this on horizontal surfaces,
2 - Assemble the side panels to the temporary form, bulkheads, transom and stem using screws,
3 - Check for straight and true assembly,
4 - Mark the bilge panels and bottom for masking and epoxy coating on the inside,
5 - Epoxy coat the bilge panels, bulkheads and bottom,
6 - Assemble the side panels and bulkheads, etc using thickened epoxy and screws to hold everything in place until the epoxy has cured,
7 - Drill holes in adjacent panels and wire the bilge panels and bottom,
8 - Use “spot welds” of unthickened epoxy and fillets to hold everything together
9 - Remove all wires
10 - Fillet, tape and epoxy all the interior joints.
11 - Sleep for a very long time.

Maybe by the end of this weekend I’ll have screwed the side panels to the bulkheads!!!! That will be exciting!

April 24, 25 & 27, 2008

About and hour of sanding on both Thursday and Friday…nothing too exciting! Finished getting the excess epoxy off the last of the long panels. I still have some bubble craters to fill but that will get done in the finishing stage I think.

Nothing done on Saturday. Was at Scheer’s Karate Tournament all day, watching Hunter and then I did some scorekeeping in the afternoon. Hunter got skunked for medals. He is at the bottom of the blue to brown belt age 10-11 category in both belt ranking and age so I knew it was going to be a tough year for him. He won one sparring match but narrowly lost the second so finished out of the medals. Still, good fun watching the kata and sparring. Once again there was a large kung-fu contingent attending. They do not spar but their katas are very different from karate katas and I thoroughly enjoy watching them.

Anyways….back to the boatbuilding. On Sunday I did a little work. First I decided to finish taping up the bottom. So, I propped up the joint on one side with 2 2×4s which opened up the joint pretty well. Then, I ran my Japanese saw down the joint a couple of times to clean out the joint and roughen it up a bit. I vacuumed out the joint and then got everything ready to epoxy it.

I got a 20 gauge syringe from my wife and loaded it up with epoxy, screwed the needle back on and then tried squeezing some epoxy out…it wouldn’t work. It blew the needle off the syringe so I just squeezed epoxy into the joint and waited for it to works its way down to the far wide. It seemed to be going somewhere as I ran the syringe down the joint a couple of times. Then, I removed the blocking to let the joint settle and brushed out the squeezeout along the joint. I propped up the ends of the bottom until the bottom was flat and then I mixed up some more epoxy.

Brushed it on both sides of the joint, laid the first piece of tape into the epoxy, stretched it out and then used my hands to smooth it into the epoxy on the plywood. It got pretty saturated just doing that. Then, I brushed on more epoxy and used the brush to work it into the tape.

Suddenly, I remembered that I have a fiberglass bubble roller from Duckworks! Ran over to the door and kicked on it until Hunter answered. Got him to get me the box of stuff from the computer room and then get the roller out for me.

I tried rolling lengthwise. I tried rolling sideways…It seemed to be working a little although the tape was pretty saturated before I tried. Then, I added the second piece of tape, brushed on more epoxy and then tried to use the roller to get rid of any whitish spots and bubbles. Once I was satisfied, I laid the wax paper on top of the joint. This is when I think a lot of the surface cratering is happening so I used the roller to roll from the centre out to the edge and work out any air spaces at all until I had pretty good smooth contact witht eh paper everywhere. I put a piece of plywood on top and weighted it down. I’m going to leave it until Tuesday before I have a look. Hopefully the epoxy migrated right to the far side and is also smmoth and bubble free on the top side.

After that was done, I cut out a piece for the stem. The piece I took off the end of the 2 x 4 had a pitch pocket that I figured would come off when I cut the bevels. Well, I was wrong…the pocket was quite deep and went right into the beveled piece. I got busy and dug out the pocket with a chisel. It wound up leaving a divot 3-4 inches long, 1/2 inch wide and 3/8 inch deep. I debated filling it with epoxy and then just decided to cut another piece off and make another stem.

Altogether I spent about 4 hours over the last 4 days for a total of 62 hours. It’s going to be interesting to see just how long this boat takes me. I have been planning on 200 hours but I am thinking it will take me longer than that. It takes me longer to think my way through every step than it would for somebody with boatbuilding/woodworking experience.

My plan is to coat the sides and bulkheads with three coats of epoxy…with the places where they will be taped and filleted masked off … before starting to assemble the sides to the temporary form, bulkheads, stem and transom. I also have to finish the framing pieces for the transom before I can start assembly. I’ll have to cut those pieces out before I start laying down epoxy as I don’t want the epoxy filled with wood dust.

4/62

Wednesday April 23, 2008

Time: 1/58

I haven’t done anything on the boat yet today as I am still at work but I just wanted to start off today’s post by saying that I got a package from Chuck and Sandra at Duckworks today and I have a Sand Shark to try out. It looks like it should be able to quickly remove some of the large waves of epoxy I have created.

Chuck and Sandra also threw in a fiberglass bubble roller for me to try out as well so I will give that a go as soon as I am ready to glass the other side of the bottom.

I saw some syringes for injecting glue on the Lee Valley website so I think I will give that a try on the bottom joint where I separated the joint. Lots of experiments coming up.

I managed to get started about 9 pm and spent an hour sanding. I tried out the Sand Shark. I sure wish it had arrived a few days ago so that I could have used it on the worst epoxy wave as it made pretty quick work of removing the excess epoxy. It makes me a bit nervous that I’ll overdo it so I only used it at the start to get the thick parts off in a hurray….and that was usign the finer side of the abrasive plate!

The craters before starting….

The craters after about a minute and a half of sanding with the Sand Shark….note the large piles of white powder…

Great tool!

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

1/57

More sanding!

Learned the lesson of changing sandpaper frequently. Did one half of one side of a joint and thought it was taking a long time. Tossed the sanding disk and put on a new one…next half went much faster.

At a cost of $0.80/disk, it isn’t worth it to use something that isn’t cutting.

I also learned that it helps with the dust collection if you line up the little holes on the disks with the holes in the sander’s pad It’s all the little things.

Only got in an hour before I went in to watch the Sharks and Flames in Game 7 of their playoff series.

My prediction for tonight…..more sanding!