zondag 30 maart 2008

Interior panels

Getting a bit fed up doing the laminations on the beam mounts, I decided to first do some of the interior panels.
I'm making a straight side on the starboard settee, with three access holes. For this panel I used lighter, cheaper, foam than the standard divinycell whicht turned out to be a big mistake. Very weak and therefore difficult to work with.
Later on I'll probably put in a raised floor. Not fixed, but removable panels resting on some edge glued to the centerboard case and the side panel shown below.
Also test-fitted the storage compartiment panel. It's running parallel with the settee-fronts and on all points at the same height relative to the settee. It looks a bit odd because the hull-side area between the panel and the settee is much wider at the front of the panel than near the main bulkhead. I'll wait a bit and make sure I want to keep the panel like this before taping it in place. I'll have to fill & sand the outside of the beam mounts a bit more before I can glass it. In the right lower corner I used a lot of putty while glassing from the inside. This is handy because it's easy to shape this corner without having to be afraid to sand into the glass.

woensdag 19 maart 2008

Front beam mount

Last mold for this beam mount. I used a hot glue gun to put and keep the mold pieces in place and stuck to each other. Very easy, should have used it earlier on.
In the front mold area (inner side, of course) I used a lot of putty in all corners, to be able to shape the protruding area on the outside without sanding into the glass. Sounds like Abracadabra? In one of the next posts I'll be able to show what I mean with a picture.
Inner laminate on the right front beam mount is in place. It took me longer than expected (over three hours) to get this job done - both sides of the mount - and I finished at about half past one in the morning. It's very busy at the moment at work and at home, so working in the evenings/nights is necessary to keep going.
I tried to laminate the "C" glass in one big piece, as I did on the rear beam mounts. This just doesn't work on the front mounts. What worked for me was: laminate beam bracket area and a bit up + overlap on hull with one piece, lapping out about 6 cm on mount. Then laminate over mold plate and up, overlapping hull and lapping out on mount. Then one piece over the mount and the bulkhead.
Then you get something looking like this......
In an earlier post I said using the angled grinder is a good way to cut the beam bracket area flush, and that is still true. However, I found out using an old saw, pressed 'flush' to the hull, works even better and with lesser mess. Dark photo alert.

zondag 16 maart 2008

Trimming coaming

Trimming the coaming with a piece of 18 mm mdf and a sander (40 grit) . Beside this I've been busy taping the underside of the cockpit seats.

zaterdag 15 maart 2008

cockpit coaming + work on front beam mounts

Mold for the compression pad. Clamped in place with two wooden sticks. Same mold, seen from the other side.
I decided to leave a small coaming in the cockpit aft of the beam mounts. The coaming has been roughly cut, dug out and filled with putty, and is taped to the cockpit seat. Once cured, I'll trim the edge using a sander & grit 40.
Stern also has been roughly cut and filled. Once cured I'll sand it back to match the final outline.

maandag 10 maart 2008

main work on cockpit done

With the coamings in place I only have to double the floor (and do some small things like filling the hatches-edges) to finish the cockpit.
I tried to get a nice picture, but it's not possible to stand back far enough. Hope this one will give an idea.
I have to decide what to do with the coaming aft of the beam mounts. Plans say I can leave a small edge here, or trim the coaming flush with the seat tops. I'm a bit in doubt here. It will be easiest and most 'clean' looking to trim the coaming flush, but without a coaming it will be very easy for things to drop into the water. On the other hand: maybe a 2 cm high ridge won't help much in this respect.
So.... I'l probably trim the coaming flush with the seats, and if that turns out to be a mistake I'll ad a sort of ridge (wood?) later on.

Any ideas are appreciated. Always nice to get real comments in stead of the 'Look Here and Here' spambot-comments.

I also cut the beam mount bolting area flush with the hull. An angled grinder works really well for this kind of jobs (lots of dust, though). As you may notice, most of the pre-molded sides of the beam mount bolting area are cut away, so it's no use to trim the home-molded side beforehand to exactly match the Farrier-molded side (as I have seen some other builders do).