About all I have been able to get done since building the rudder is sanding, sanding, and sanding the fillets. They are starting to look pretty good--I don't have any pictures, but the newer fillets don't look much different than the earlier ones. The fillets in the rear compartment were acceptable, but I felt they needed some smoothing. There were quite a few low spots, but they were so shallow I'm not sure they would have caused any problems. However, once that compartment is sealed up I will never be able to see in there again and if a delamination or something else catastrophic were to occur I would not even know about it. So after much sanding I added another layer of fillet material and got it smoothed out pretty well as you can see here:
 |
| Rear Compartment Fillets |
 |
| Rear Compartment Fillets |
 |
| Hull 'Glass Template |
After finishing that job I decided to begin making templates for the fiberglass that will cover the bottom-inside of the hull. Only one template is done so far. As you can see, the fiberglass will lap up onto the sides and the bulkheads. There will be an overlap of about 6" over the keelson at the bottom-center. This will add a lot of strength--that section will have a double layer. The fiberglass will also be overlapped above the floorboard joists.
The manual doesn't mention anything about making the templates, but I can't think of any better way to get the fiberglass cut to fit. Laying it in there and cutting it would be much harder and would probably damage the cloth here and there. The two sides of the hull are mirror images, so I will only have to make templates for one side, and then use them for both.
No comments:
Post a Comment