Sand,sand, sand

In starting this blog my intention was to give folks to the encouragement to start their own project and perhaps avoid a mistake or three that I have made along the way.  Not keeping up the blog means that a good deal of the latter intention is lost for the ages.  I have quite a few pictures, but the reality is that a lot of things I meant to capture and write about are no longer part of my detailed knowledge.  None-the-less I will take a stab at capturing the high and low points of the past 6 months effort.  A few things were painful enough to lodge in my long term memory.

This is a picture of Eel Pond in Woods Hole.  My Grady is on the dock way to the right in the back ground in front of the Marine Resources Center.  Woods Hole is a fantastical place to spend the Summer and we are lucky enough to not only have a boat, but a cottage as well.  So though not much time was spent on the build during the Summer, the time was well spent on boats and being on the water.

I ordered Dynel cloth from Jamestown.  I forgot how much, but it wasn't enough.  I had to go back over the Christmas break and buy a few more yards.  I chose Dynel because that is what Doug Hylan used.  The stuff is tough.  Sanding was a bear.  One think I was not keen on though was the hydrophobicity of the cloth.  It was very difficult to get all the bubble out from underneath the cloth after I layed it down on the hull.  I read and watched several videos and articles.  One completely submerged the cloth in a huge tray before applying.  I don't have that kind of space and am way too cheap to make enough excess epoxy to first submerge the cloth and then apply.  I also was always working alone and so the soaking method didn't really appeal.  We shall see if I was shortsighted in saving on materials and applying the cloth and then wetting through.  There are definitely teeny bubbles in spots, but I suspect this would be true no matter the method.  I'm not worried.  Laying the cloth took a lot more time than I expected.  I worked with small batches of epoxy - about 200 mls I suspect.  When it got cold, I put the metal cans on a hotplate I liberated from the lab many years ago.  The added fluidity of the warmed up epoxy definitely made for easier and quicker pumping and I'm sure improved my epoxy to hardener ratio accuracy.  And I only left the hot plate on by mistake one long afternoon.  I wasn't overly careful about the corners, as you can see from the pic above and aimed to beef up the corners with a few overlays of cloth and epoxy.

Here I have the bottom of the hull covered.  I decided to put the keel on *after* covering the bottom.  I like the notion that the keel can be repaired and the integrity essentially maintained.  If I ever need to do this I have really screwed up though, eh?  I also laid out the cloth so that I would get an overlap of cloth at the chine.  This intentional as I think this is the place most likely to get dinged by a rock in the Hole.  The amount of overlap increases dramatically in the forward most third of the hull.  It's unsightly and I could have cut it back, but that would not be consistent with sloppy copy etiquette and a desire to trade a bit more weight for a stouter exterior.  My Fein vacuum got a workout throughout all this work.  I was faithful in wearing a mask and have not had any issues with dust in the lungs.

Sadly I must include one of my Dynel goofs.  Near the stem I ran out of time -- I think we had a swim meet or something came up -- while I was laying and wetting the cloth.  I figured I would be able to pick up where I left off.  Wrong.   Way wrong.  The edge was a wreck and when I did finally finish all the way to the stem I was left with a section that was not adhering to the boat.  So I had to sand/grind it off and do some repair work.  Not the worst task, but I wish I had pressed on and finished the job all the way to the stem.  Oh well.

One tricky task that I did not document or write about was getting the bottom of the hog flat before attaching the keel.  In several spots my plywood pieces and hog did not come together all that firmly.  I definitely could have done a better job, but I have neither the patience or frankly the skill to have all the pieces intersect consistently well. There are a lot of intersecting angles.  Oversanding the hog in a couple of spots didn't help.  I filled in the low spots with some thickened epoxy and took off the high spots with my belt sander.  I can't imagine doing this kind of work without the miracle properties of plastic.

At this point most of the hull has been covered in Dynel.  There were a couple of spots that I had to go back and cover with some shorter, custom-cut pieces of cloth.  Lot's of sanding.  And then more sanding.  Did I mention I spent hours sanding?  I used several scrap pieces of bamboo flooring to fashion a long, 3' sanding block and added 60 grit paper with contact cement to get the inner stem plane sufficiently flat.  Worked well.

At this stage I needed to go find some wood for the keel.  I discovered Downes and Reader in nearby Stoughton Mass and bought a few pieces of 8 quarter mahogany.  What an amazing place.  I can't believe I have been working with hardwoods for 20+ years and never made my way there.  I can't wait to go back.  I had to glue up two pieces to get to an appropriate length.  I think I cut this piece on the bandsaw, but don't really remember.  My table saw is inoperable during the build.  I could have used white oak here.  They had plenty of oak and all kinds of other species.  Went with mahogany in the end because all the other exterior pieces are mahogany.

I decided to use my joiner hand plane rather than the 8" Delta because I need the exercise and it just seemed like the way to go.  It didn't take too long and I liked the results.  Don't need no noisy Delta.

I countersunk a series of holes every 18 inches (I think) in the keel and attached the whole thing with 2" #14 (?) silico-bronze screws right into the hog.  I considered through bolting but decided that screws and epoxy were sufficient to keep the keel on.  It's at this stage of the build that the plans Doug supplies start to get thin and the photographs ever farther apart in their accomplishments.  I emailed Doug about attaching the keels and whether I needed through bolts and he suggested that screws and epoxy should be fine.  There are almost no pictures of the prep and layout of the interior of the boat in the files that Doug provides.  Thankfully there is at least one very thorough blog detailing high quality (at least much higher than mine) work on a Hylan design.

I attached the stem with three through bolts.  I used stainless as silica bronze was going to get ridiculously expensive and wasteful if I got it at Jamestown, as they have minimum numbers of pieces for these long bolts and I only needed one each of 3 lengths.

Doh!

OK...now that I've got that out, I can tell you that the little piece of mahogany on the top (destined to be the bottom) of the outer stem is because I glued the outer stem on 1 inch too low.  I had fashioned a small piece of oak I had lying around as a template for the base of the keel and it had a piece missing on the end.   I forgot about that cut off end when I lined up the outer stem and so ended up an inch too low.  So I decided to add the little piece on the end to make up the difference.  There are 3 screws and some epoxy to hold it in place.  Seems solid.

The lower picture shows how I had to apply a fillet to get the whole outer stem looking like it should.  A little epoxy and a lot of embarrassment.

I have the keel attached above and have just filled in all the holes with thick epoxy.  The lower picture of the shop floor was taken inadvertently, but I think it captures well what the shop looks like in the heat of the action, so I include it here.  

I added the outer rails one side at a time.  Thankfully I have a lot of clamps.

I put a layer of dynel over the keel and feathered it out about 6 inches on either side.  I put a second coat of epoxy over the whole exterior.  Lots of sanding. Filleting.  More sanding.  More filleting. etc.  I spend a good month doing this.

Then I put on two coats of epoxy primer.  The primer showed where I had done a poor job filleting, but decided to live with the Sloppy Copy result.

Got this at Jamestown.  Went on very easily with a roller.  This amount got me two coats.  Easily.

The view from the yard looking into the shop.

One small step

19 May 2015

I spent two hours last night plugging all these hundreds of holes with very thick epoxy.  I've been using a mix of 403 fibers and 406 microspheres -- the logic being the former adds some dimensional strength and the latter more hardness.  I pretty much just spoon in the two in roughly equal amounts until I get the consistency I want for minimal runs.  Last nights batches were almost peanut butter consistency.  So thick in fact that I struggled to get the mixture into the 10ml plastic pipettes I was using.  I fitted a 200 ul Eppendorf tip on the end of the pipettes and then used some modest air pressure from my compressor to drive the mix into the holes.  It was a lot like piping a cake (never having done any piping....).

One thing I will do differently on the next boat is use stainless steel screws for all these temporary screw clamps.  The cheapo Home Depot screws I used often lost their heads when I tried to back them out.  The *worst* mistake I made was getting epoxy in the head slots.  Those I generally had to drill out, which was both very slow work and often made a mess.  I tried getting the problematic screws out from the inside, but there just wasn't enough to grab onto and provide sufficient torque.  Longer screws might help in this regards.  In any case,  my cheap #6, 3/4 inch screws were not up to the task, so I'll try something else next time. 

The second layer done.  Hurray!  Definitely both a small and a big step. I started filling in some gaps between the layers of plywood and the hog with the left overs from the hole-epoxy injection process.  It took me a good 2 hours between mixing, plugging and smoothing the excess.

Another view.  Time to order the Dynal sheathing and get started smoothing and filleting (spelt right?)

Catching up

I have a lot of pics describing things that have not made it into the blog.  So this post will be a set of random shots and comments.

This pic shows the 6 mm outer layer before many sanding or shaping of any sort.  

Here you can see how ragged the edges got where the 6 mm layers meet the hog.  Perhaps I should have fitted better?  I relied on the planar and sander to bring all into one plane along the top of the hog.  Could have done this better.  I put my time and energy and attention to the parallel edges of the pieces running from chine to hog.  You can see where I way over sanded the very front of the hog.  I later glued in a piece of fir (and then largely chipped it out when planing the leading edge of the inner hog).

Gluing the hog to the inner stem.  Lots of challenging angles here.

I am not sure I mentioned that I ran out of 6 mm plywood before I finished the sheathing.  Big problem at the time as the closest place to get marine plywood is an hour away and only open during work hours.  I had one piece missing (see below) and another of equal size near at the stem.  The picture below is of all the scraps. I was not at all wasteful in cutting the overlapping pieces.  I was able to get another sheet but wished I had purchased an extra sheet from Doug.  I could have pieced together some little pieces, but it seemed not a good idea.

The missing piece.

A pic of the transition before I fit the first layer.

More pics of the rough, dry fit.

More glue up

27 April 2015

Gluing up the outer stem from two true 1x4 Philippine mahogany.  Probably $50 or more of wood.  I wanted something extra hard facing the world.  A brass half round will go on the outside.  I also scarfed the two guards.  They are one and a half wide by 7/8 thick and at this point about a foot longer than the boat.  A little clean up and a cut to length and they will be ready to attach.

I used this little Dremel saw to cut all the quarter inch (6 mm) pieces.  I liked the weight and ability to see the lines I had laid out.  I am sure I will use it a lot in the future.

A vase I threw and glazed (random pic).

Let's glue

 25 April 2015

I started gluing in the past week.  I was off for a few weeks of vacation and such and wanted to wait for some consistently warmer weather.  I found I could do few feet in an hour, so did the inner 6 mm layer evenings in the course of a week.

I am using West System epoxy.  I did three 'shots' at a time using the fast hardener (it's about 50 degrees F in the shop this time of year) and added a few scoops of 403 microfibers.  In my hands at this temp, I found that 3 squirts worked for me.  I used a small brush to coat each edge and to paint about 3 inches on either end.  I wanted to make sure I had epoxy on any surface I was not going to see again on the inside near the hog or the chine.

First afternoon's work. 

I used a couple of small blocks and planes to get even pressure on the sheathing where it meets the inner stem.

Close up of the blocks.  They helped a lot to bring the edges in tight to the stem.

Another shot showing the placement and number of screws.  Many of the screws ended up in regions where I applied epoxy.  I would/will not do this again, as many of the screws got set in ways unintended.

I keep a list of things to get on a white board in the shop.

The photo below shows all the pieces from one side.  One inner and one outer layer.

The first inner piece.  

Ready to glue. 

Ready to take off quarter inch pieces before glue up

The view below shows the hog and the inner stem.  I've planed down the two layers on each side to meet the hog.  You can see (sort of) the modest undulations and varying width of the hog and sides.  I found that if I went for tight plane, I ended up with sides that curved in and out.  If I kept the sides of the sheathing parallel I risked going too deep into the hog.  This is definitely something I could improve upon with some practice and greater patience, but best not to overthink I say and learn by doing...

You can also see where I took a nice chink out of the repair to the hog where it meets the stem.  Not a pretty sight.  The lines of the boat however are starting to emerge and they are very nice indeed.

More prep work in bringing the sides and the hog into a consistent plane in prep for gluing and eventually the keel.

I discovered that a 1 inch half round for the boat would be about $400.  I can live with that, but the shipping cost from Rhode Island to my home in Plymouth (about a 1.5 hour drive at most) would be >$700.  So I will be taking the pickup to Rhode Island before too long on a visit to Jamestown Hardware.  At least they have it...

There are several hundred holes to be countersunk, so I was happy to have an assistant.  At this point all the pieces for both layers have been dry fitted and all the holes countersunk.  We are taking out the screws in prep for the glue up.

A funny angle, but the plywood forward of the rear sheets is all off.  Some more support for the plywood pieces closer to the stem would be helpful and reassuring.  Woodyboat21 added another piece (I believe before he attached the chines to the inner stem) on either side and I wish I had done the same.  I will add some additional support after I flip the boat and before I epoxy the insides.

More of the same.  The angles of the hog are much nicer looking in person.

Stem prep

25 April 2014

You can see the results of my first pass on planing the two sheets of 6 mm plywood and in particular the transition near station three.  I ended up taking some of the 'too close to the edge screws' out and did a modest amount of clean up.  One could spend an infinite amount of time here.  The 

I labelled all the pieces.

I put quite a number of holes in each piece in preparation for the glue up.  I decided to use plain old Home Depot #8 screws even though I had a few boxes (read a few hundred dollars worth) of #6 and #8 silicon carbide screws.  Using the cheapo screws was a bad decision.  After the epoxying the inner layer I found that the head twisted off about 1 in 20.  If I used the silicon carbide I'm sure they would have stood up better to the torque from the wrench.  I countersunk holes along the edges and the middle of the outer layer to make sure 

You can see the outer 6 mm pieces (the third, fourth and fifth from the stem) in the photo below.  I've planed down the two layers so that they meet the bottom of the hog.  I warn all future builders that it is very easy to take too much off the hog and top of the planking and cause a local dip in the plane of the hog where it will meet the keel.  I have not attached the keel yet, but I foresee some kind of filling in of a few modest, few millimeter, swales in the hog.  I will either epoxy in some sort of sacrificial piece that I can plane more carefully and evenly, or I will attempt to fill in with some epoxy.  

Working to get the stem in in a single plane perpendicular to the center line of the boat.

A work in progress.

Still in progress.  The bulge in the sheathing on the left side of the photo was more prominent than I would have liked.  In the glue up I used some clamps to better align and clamp to the inner stem.