Thread: stitch and tape power boat

Here's a picture from a few days ago when the boat was first stitched together and rolled over ready for tabbing together.

she looks nice

my first boat i built was a stitch and glue and was amazed at how fast it comes together

what design is it?

It's called the Mushulu 14. Yes I do agree, they do snap together pretty quick. The longest part of the whole job is waiting for the epoxy to go off. If your interested, as time progresses, I'll post more pictures.
Mark

Originally Posted by Mark Bowdidge

If your interested, as time progresses, I'll post more pictures.
Mark

Yes please Mark

yes please i love looking at picys of boats at different stages of construction

Here's a few earlier pictures when the panels were marked out from the plans and then cut out with a jigsaw.Only took us 2 hours roughly to cut out all the components for the boat.

The boat in the first stages of stitching togeher and also creating the seats and dry fitting in the boat

Here's a few more pictures with the boat tabbed together and the seats made.We've dry fitted the seats again for the final fit before tabbing into position. Overall, it really simple and quick.

Is it worthwhile epoxying the whole panel when you're doing the fillet, or is it better to do that later?

Originally Posted by Darce

Is it worthwhile epoxying the whole panel when you're doing the fillet, or is it better to do that later?

i think it is better to do the epoxying after all your fillets are done, so the boat is encapsulated with epoxy in one go, plus you will need to sand the fillet and a bit of the surrounding area which will remove the epoxy around the fillet needing it to be done again.

Richard

G'day you pair,
I totally agree with epoxying the panel while doing fillets. But here ( sorry about the pictures) the fillet has been glassed as well. Later, the total inside will be glassed (for abrasion), bogged and then faired for painting. That's why the panel wasn't epoxied
regards
Mark

Howdy,

In production setups we have become quite used to precoating and sanding. Saves so much time over any other method .. the interior of the boat is mostly sanded ready to paint and varnish when it goes together.

Also it saves a lot of epoxy as the quantities and application is much more controllable working on the flat - you can generally work on given volumes or weights per coat per face.

It also almost ensures the inside surface of the boat will be dead flat before painting or varnishing.

But you do need to be VERY confident about your dewaxing or the non waxing of the epoxy being used.

There used to be a lot said about primary vs secondary bonds but WEST who do most of the real research have de-emphsised the difference in recent years.

In semi production - probably say an experienced amateur - some will still prefer to run masking tape along bulkhead positions on the panels to get a primary bond there. It does mean that there are likely to be some areas that need to be touched up with a brush later. But the areas are small and quckly touched up. If the fillets are being glassed no touch up at all is likely to be required.

Best wishes
Michael

I totally agree Mike. In our previous company where we used to build recreational and commercial vessels up to 60 ft in length, one had to determine the method and what to apply to each and every job. If this was for example, a small sailing dinghy of around 13 ft, with little or no taping, then yes, I would precoat the plywood, However, for power boats, and being that the loads are much higher, the glass used is Double Bias and cloth . These edges will need to be feathered and faired before applying the next layer of glass for the flat areas. Precoating the panels in this case would be a waste of time. So in all, you need to judge what need to be done in order to acheive the desired result with minimal wastage and labour.
. In regards to this boat, the areas under the seats and bow sections where coated with 3 coats of epoxy prior to the seats being tabbed into place.
regards
Mark

I'm stoked. You've answered more than one question for me here guys.

Cheers