No, you are almost right!

Typically the fibreglass tape goes on both sides, and the gaps are filled with bog before hand. Nothing could be simpler. The ply meets perfectly on the inside, and the little vee joints get filled on the outside before glassing.

Using the BoatCote epoxy system, the filler is almost timber colour and barely visible.

In the "don't try this at home folks" mode, I decided to attempt a perfect-on-the-outside joint, and will get a heap of epoxy filleting practice on the inside. Of course that's why Michael in particular is laughing, I've turned a simple process into a not so simple one!

Of course time will show that I could have achieved the same result in half the time, but then I'd have to go paddling!

Michael does provide a comprehensively illustrated set of instructions with the plans , and I've taken to reading them retrospectively, (after I've completed each stage!)
http://www.storerboatplans.com
Cheers,

P

__________________

Instructions???? Are you supposed to read them? I usually just file them with the reciept and warranty!

They are good later to find out why your project has no resemblence to the original...............

I understand what you were doing by bevelling the edges of the sheets to get a tight join, but I don't quite understand how you would get a nice straight chine by leaving the edges of the sheets square (like you're meant to). I'm just picturing in my mind the two sheets always wanting to either slip inside or outside of each other instead of meeting each other on their corners. Does this make sense?

__________________
Dan

Dan,

It's not as hard as it seems. The timber obviously crushes a little on the meeting corners, but because one is tightening each stitch in a controlled way it's very easy to control, and align progressively.

I've made it even harder because I have effectively got a knife-edge to meet for all the places where the angle is greater than 90° (which is everywhere really!), but even so the alignment isn't that hard.

Any misalignment in a normal construction would be taken up with an epoxy fillet before glassing in any case.

If that's not clear, please respond!

Cheers,

P

__________________

Friday night and no chance of being home long enough to do anything on the weekend!

Here's an update:
The "sewing" is now complete, and the temporary spreaders in place.

I've clamped a couple of temporary gunwhales in place as well, and wish I still lived near my mate with the other thirty clamps! When we had 60 between us it was quite civilised really.

The boat has about 4 or 5mm of twist at the moment, and that's about as good as I can get it without applying any "persuasion". I've shimmed it a bit but may have to clamp it while epoxying. There's still quite a lot of "floppyness" so we'll see how it all works out!

I'm hoping to use packaging tape over the outside of the seams, but that will be a cow of a job, 200 stitches means 200 bits of tape between them I guess!

I'll press down the stitches into the ply tomorrow before we go, and maybe mask the seams ready for some nice neat fillets (if I can remember how to do that!).

In the meantime, this is a bit what one imagine's Frankenstein's boat might have looked like!
Cheers,

P

Attached Thumbnails

       

__________________

Hey Peter, isn't the ballast supposed to go in the bottom of the boat? And with it sitting up there on the gunwales like that, isn't it going to get in they way?

With the stitching, just push them flat and tape over the top of them. You've got good joints there so not much epoxy is going to come through anyway.

Richard

__________________
Striding fearlessly where those with more sense fear to tread

Good?

They're PERFECT!!

But the 4mm ply does deflect a little, so the tape will just add a bit of insurance during the filleting process.

Did I mention that I've decided to fillet the inside instead of glassing?? :eek: :eek:

Cheers,
P (Taking a simple concept and making it hard!)

__________________

Ahh, stitch and poo - you fillet AND glass. Dat's da vay hit his dun :confused:

Richard

rats, not enough bundy in the bottle get ratted

__________________
Striding fearlessly where those with more sense fear to tread

Nice work P.

Bummer! Well there's always something goes wrong isn't there!

Friday night, I masked the inside to get the fillets all neat. Some would consider masking fillets a bit on the pedantic side, but I find it's a lot lot easier to spend the time masking than cleaning them up later.

Anyway, all done, flip the boat over and tape the seams where leaks are likely, then leave it till maybe Sunday afternoon when we get back from another hectic round of social engagements.

This morning: well the 19 x 19 pine I used as a temporary gunwhale decided that one of it's finger joints had had enough! So today instead of getting the inside fillets done, it was pull off the temp gunwhales, and scarf the broken one back together. You get that!

Pic 1 shows masking process: I stick a bit of masking tape down to use as a guide, then mask to it. Seems cumbersome, but it gives nice parallel lines with the minimum of fuss.

Other pics show how a small break in a straight edge will really upset a nice fair curve!



Cheers,

P

Attached Thumbnails

     

__________________

Permission granted to swear Midge.

Richard

and I thought I made hard work of building boats

__________________
Striding fearlessly where those with more sense fear to tread

Midge, when you glass the canoe are you going to use peel ply & a roller or coat and squeegee

__________________
If I do not clearly express what I mean, it is either for the reason that having no conversational powers, I cannot express what I mean, or that having no meaning, I do not mean what I fail to express. Which, to the best of my belief, is not the case.
Mr. Grewgious, The Mystery of Edwin Drood - Charles Dickens

I've never seen peel ply used without a full vac bag system? My understanding of it's use is that it is designed to apply pressure to the laminate, so that excess resin is squeezed through it and evacuated from the layup to get the optimum resin mix, in relatively high tech composites. I have used it in carbon/kevlar/s-glass over foam layups, but wouldn't have thought it worth it at this scale, (I'm not building a world - championship kayak here, so the extra 50 grams probably won't kill me).

If anyone can cast light on peel ply on a non-vac situation, please do so!

The boat WILL be light though, and I'll use a foam roller, a disposable brush, and an old credit card as a squeegee. My gloved hand will also probably figure in there, so the chances of getting a decent photo are not great!

cheers,

P

__________________

I read somewhere of a guy using peel ply and a roller to press it down, leaving a smooth finish. I'll see if I can find the references.

__________________
If I do not clearly express what I mean, it is either for the reason that having no conversational powers, I cannot express what I mean, or that having no meaning, I do not mean what I fail to express. Which, to the best of my belief, is not the case.
Mr. Grewgious, The Mystery of Edwin Drood - Charles Dickens

Hi Midge!
I used peel ply on my trailer sailer when glassing the outside of the planking. By pushing the stuff down into the layup with a grooved roller, you get an even resin layup with all the bumps and dribbles of excess epoxy on the outside as well as the waxy bloom that forms when there is any humidity. Then, when you are ready to fair it off, rip it off, taking all the unevenness with it. It saves loads of time, costs a bit but worth every cent!
Cheers,
Graeme