Although I would like to make an excuse for the time between this post and the last one, I don't have one. Just getting lazy about documenting the process. I'll try to catch you up.
Not pictured is the work that I did at the bow. I decided to use self-expanding foam to fill the watertight compartment in from of bulkhead #1. My plan was to do much like Jeff Hatch did in his PocketShip. The idea is to create a corridor between the access port and the location where the bow U-bolt will be placed by cutting a piece of 6" PVC to fit. Then to pour self expanding foam into the bow that will expand around the PVC pipe.
Great idea however cutting a piece of PVC to exactly fit all the angles in 3-dimensions was much harder than I had anticipated. So I decided to get it very close and then use gorilla tape to seal it with bulkhead #1 and the hull at the bow. This plan seemed solid. After all was said and done the PVC was solidly taped at both ends. I check and rechecked to make sure there would be no leaks.
At this point I mixed a quart of the foam and poured it into the front compartment. It expanded wonderfully. More than it should have because it was so hot outside. But that didn't seem to be a problem. It didn't completely fill the front bulkhead so I mixed up about half as much and poured that. That did the trick and the bulkhead compartment overflowed. No problem there, I would just use a saw to cut away the excess.
After the foam cured I opened the inspection port and to my horror about the bottom 1/3 of the tube was filled with foam. I must have had a leak somewhere. Damn! That foam is tough too. I chipped away at it with a chisel, pried some out broke up as much as I could but just couldn't seem to get it all. This was awkward work too. My arm down to the shoulder in a tube trying to get that foam out. That's when inspiration hit. I dragged out my Dremel tool with the flexible shaft extension and put a carving bit on the end. I fired up the tool and in about 20 minutes I had cut up the foam enough that I could break it out and have access to the bow bolt. Still not fun.
That's when I came across another problem. The expanding foam had pushed the bow end of the tube up about 1" from the original center mark. Some quick calculations on the placement of the bow eye revealed that it shouldn't be an issue. Although I had dodged the bullet on this one I was starting to have some doubts about my building skills.
I trimmed the foam and epoxied the bow deck in place. No problems with that, and in retrospective everything is fine. Just a big scare.
The day had finally come to do the upper deck sides. This phase seems to be the part that every builder likes. Lots of changes to the way the boat looks with only a little effort.
Again, I have to say the quality of the kit is fantastic. Everything fit with the right angles and very few gaps. Lots of wire stitches to adjust to get it exactly right but in the end no surprises or gotchas.
Above you can see the progress of the cockpit. Looks great and feels VERY solid.
Here I'm showing how well the kit fits together. Notice that the upper hull runs from the point of the bow to the transom. Also note how it ends almost perfectly. Not bad for a 3 dimensional piece of wood that has to wrap around a bunkheads and twist at the same time.
Here to you can see my angle tool. It was adjusted to the angle from the plans. Once the bulkhead #3 was dropped in place and aligned with the sides the angle just naturally happened. It astounded me how perfect it was with no adjustments.
The front also came together perfectly.
The seat back frames fit very well.
At this point I've tack welded everything and removed the stitches. It was a big job but the reward is something that looks a lot more like a boat.
Hours this session: 20
Hours total: 309
