Out of the building cradle

On friday i lifted the Gig out of her building cradle ready to roll her over ready for final fairing & painting.

In the background are the rear doors to the shed, there is 1" clearance each side, and yes i have measured it!
I have worked out a good way of doing the stretchers but it will entail some stainless steel welding, I had better get some practice in!

Once rolled over i started fairing, didnt go well at first as the the filler i had skimmed her with clogged the sandpaper really badly, i identified the problem as the vinylester laminating resin i had used being unwaxed. This meant that the surface although cured had a faint tackiness. Remedy was to get a wide carbide scraper & scrape the surface layer off, several hours later with arms dropping of she was ready for a sand down & first coat of Hi build primer.
The hull is very fair & the time spent on the building jig was well spent.

The primer is a Hempels two part epoxy intended for superyachts, the local chandler has a job lot of the stuff. Downside was it stinks something awful & i had to open the doors & windows wide.
Overnight it had cured well enough for a rough sand up before the second coat.

The second coat went on this morning & by lunchtime was touch dry
Back to the sanding tomorrow if its cured enough!

Im looking forward to the not too distant future when you can see her out on the water not stuck in a shed!

More nice bits = progress!

Good progress today, she is starting to look like she might get wet sometime soon!
                                                                                           


Got the thwart knees all rounded off
with the router & fastened in along
with the rowlock blocks.
Thwart knees are laminated mahogany & are barely 3/4" thick.

I now have to figure a simple strong & light foot stretcher system, the rowers will sit slightly staggered.

This Gig is a real meld between modern GRP boatbuilding & traditional wooden construction, if i ever get as far as a production version it will have far less woodwork on it!

Weight wise i am pleased my son & i can pick her up one each end quite easily.

A day away from her tomorrow as i am in the home workshop, a friend is coming round to wire up a couple of machines for me,i might be able to build boats but i avoid wiring especially 3 phase!
First to be done is my trusty Harrison 140 metal lathe,
i need to get it running to turn up some custom rowlock pins.
The other is a Union graduate wood turning lathe, just come out of a school.

A man can never have too many tools!

Fitting the nice bits!

I have been busy this week fitting out, the new thwarts were bolted in today with their pillars & all the thwart knees are fitted. Also got the rowlock blocks fitted.

I have got the coamings on the fore & after deck.
More photos of the details tomorrow!

I Was hoping to have got more done but had an attempted break in last weekend, i had to spend some time doing repairs & applying anti climb paint to the edges of the roof. It is lovely stuff, thick non drying paint that gets everywhere.
Despite wearing gloves i had to throw my shirt away afterwards.
Its the price of having a workshop in a remote location but then friends had a yard broken into which was like fort knox with cameras & everything.
The fact that the building is insured along with everything in it gives peace of mind. However i dont leave power tools there overnight!

Last of the fibreglass work!

I have been finishing of all the structural bits, seat risers with plywood inserts & bonded in fasteners to bolt the thwarts to, bilge stringers to mount the stretchers on & floors to stiffen the hull bottom.
 

 This shot shows the seat riser core built from foam & the first floor fitted.

The rectangluar cut outs in the core next to the keel are for two Elvstrom self bailers.

Fore deck & afterdeck fitted & bonded on.
This forms two large wateright buoyancy tanks.
All risers & stringers now bonded in with csm & biaxial cloth.
Vinlyester resin used thoughout. 

To the left of the boat you can see a large pile of timber. This was liberated last week from a friends barn where it had lain for the last 30 years.
Offered as mahogany it was not clear quite what it was as it was rather filthy but it turned out to be a mixture of brazilian mahogany, Utile, Iroko & Dark red meranti.
Mostly in wide 11ft & 16ft boards 2" plus thick it was a good result!
On the floor to the right of the boat are the gunwales.
And if anyone wants to know what the bucket is doing in the middle of the picture, its to hold the chains from the lifting tackle & stop me banging my head!

Thwarts are also all machined up & ready to go in, first set i machined i junked as the timber had a nasty streak of sapwood. Second set came up very well.
More progress!

Inner skin

Busy day yesterday, first job was to fit wooden inserts at the rowlock positions so i can fasten braces fron the gunwale down to the hull. Then it was final beveling of the core edge clean up & lay up the in

You can see the two inserts at the top of the hull, they are overlaid with unidirectional roving. Also a strip seen going in at thwart position.

Inner skin all laid up. Strips of unidirectional reinforcement staggered down the hull.

This shot also shows the temporary gunwale batten screwed on to hold the sheer fair while the glass goes off, i trimmed the glass of while still green, saves grinding nasty glass!

Next job is seat risers, bilge stringers & floors.

Off the mould

Spent this morning assembling the building cradle for the Gig. After lunch it was pull the screws holding the core on & go for the lift. All went well.







Heres my son Nick standing by the hull
You may think she is laying over rather a lot, thats because she is sitting on keelblocks to take the lifting eyes out of the keel.

Second photo is dropped into the builing cradle. it has three grp supports which were laminated round the hull over mylar.

Trim up the sheer tomorrow &.Start fitting solid core panels, they have to be fitted at high stress points Also a bit of filling to do!
Well pleased with progress.

Layup time

Spent the last two days laying up the outer skins, all went well. I must be getting old, i could only stand half a day laying glass. It was pretty warm & the fumes got more than a bit heavy so i had all the doors & windows open. Finished at lunchtime.
Think if i do much more of this i will invest in an air fed respirator!

Tomorrows job is to lay up a couple of suppports for a cradle to support the hull while laying up the inside layer & fitting out.
Looks like hull lift off & turn over on monday.