BUILDING A SKERRY Days 21 - 25
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Offerings to the Spirit of "ET Bugaboo" Days 1 - 5 : Order, Instructions, Clean garage, Glue panel scarfs Days 6 - 10 : Glue outwale sections, Sand scarfs, Measure for frames, Drill wire holes, Sand & taper outwales Days 11 - 15 : Cut gains, More wire holes, Wire Panels, Insert frames Days 16 - 20 : Fix "gap" problem, Glue Mast Scarf, Sprit Scarf, Skeg Halves, and Centerboard Handles, "Tab" Glue Seams Days 21 - 25 : Remove Wires, Glue Seams, Clean up Seams, Shape Stem and Stern Days 26 - 30 : Glassing and coating the exterior Days 36 - 40 : Rails (cont.), Skeg Days 41 - 45: More epoxy, Fiberglass & coat interior Days 46 - 50: Install Seats and Centerboard Box Days 51 - 55: Still doing the Seats and Centerboard Box Day 56: Making it rowable Day 57 - 60: Sanding the fillets, Making Spars, Figuring out the rudder Day 61 - 65: Rudder and Dagger Board Day 66 - 70: Rudder (cont.) Day 70 - 75: Dagger Board Slots, Partner "Adapter", Install Mast Step Day 76 - 80: Sewing the Sail, Adding Lead to Daggerboard, Floorboards Day 81 - 85: Floorboards (cont.) Day 86 - 90: Floorboards (cont.). Foot Braces, Sanding, sanding, sanding,... Day 91 - 95: Finishing Day 96 - 98: ...and more Finishing, Rigging
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Day 21 (5/3/03) - 2 Hrs: Today, the wires were removed. Cut from the inside and pulled from the outside. Except for the stern, bow and frames, the hull is free of sharp points that stick me in the arm, every time I squeeze by, when passing through the garage. In a few cases, there was epoxy on the wire, on the inside of the hull. When this happened, I crawled underneath and pulled the wire from the other side. Using a syringe, the seams were filled with more epoxy mix. The idea is to get the epoxy level with edge of the outer panel at the seam. To do this I used a 2" wide plastic putty knife. I figure I will need to add a bit more epoxy mix in some places to get it level all around.
Day 22 (5/4/03) - 1/2 Hr: Added more "mustard" mix (a bit thicker than yesterday) to the seams. Yesterdays application settled into the seams (which is what you want for strength), so today additional mix was required on all seams over he entire hull.
Day 23 (5/6/03) - 1/2 Hr: The final application of seam epoxy to "square off" the laps. I will need to file down a few spots that overflowed, but that can wait.
Day 24 (5/7/03) - 2 Hrs: Today, the hull was turned right-side-up. On the inside stem and stern seams I applied a 3/4" fillet of "peanut butter" mix from the bottom panel up to within 1" of the sheer. I shaped one of my plastic putty knives so the edge was 3/4". this helped significantly with the application.
3" fiberglass tape was then placed over the fillet and saturated with epoxy until it was translucent (***TIP: measure and cut the tape before applying the fillet. It's a lot easier). This gave a taste of what fiberglassing the hull is going to be like. I was concerned with all of the wrinkles in the tape when I first set it in place on the curving stern. However, when applying the epoxy, it isn't hard to brush the wrinkles out.
I also applied spots of "mustard" mix between the panels and the frames for a temporary hold. This was done with a syringe.
*** NOTE: I'll have to go back and check the instructions about removing the wires holding the panels to the frame. If the assumption is that they should have been removed when the lap stitches were removed, I would recommend against it. I would be concerned about the frames popping out, or just shifting and altering the shape of the hull you have worked so hard to obtain. I have left them in and will remove them after the temporary glue has cured, and before I start glassing the outside. This may be what CLC intended, after all... A few steps back, I applied just enough epoxy mix to the outside stem and stern seams to keep them from separating. So, once I was comfortable that the fillets I created this morning had cured enough to hold (in my case, about 5 hours at 75 degrees) I decided to cut and pull the wires at the stem and stern while the fillet was still soft enough to get them through. This worked nicely and I don't have to file the ends of remaining wires down, later (for some reason, the idea of that really bugged me).
Day 25 (5/8/03) - 3 Hrs: Turned the hull upside down and removed the wires for the frames. The hull is now free of wires!!!!!! I found that snipping the wire on both sides of the frame allowed me to pull the wire out cleanly. I then went underneath and pulled the remaining sections through the frames.
Sanded down the seam between the bottom and #1 panels. I had piled on the epoxy near the stern, so I had quite a bit of sanding to do there. I now have a smooth, rounded seam.
I then used a rasp to shave down the stem and stern to 1" flat edges from bottom to sheer. I then took the ROS and rounded these off.
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