Week 12 & 13 Fitting out

The past two weeks has seen the biggest leap forward in the boat. The foam sole board supports were fiited in with their mahogany cappings first. These took a long time to get right with a good fit but the end result has been really good enabling an easy fit of the floor boards. The bulk heads were then fitted both fore and aft and then the deck beams fitted. The correct camber of the deck was laid out on the bulkhead beams closest to the cockpit and then worked back on the subsequent beams both fore and aft. With all the bulkheads and deck beams in place the breast hook was made and fitted last weekend allowing the king planks to be notched in place on Monday. This was duly carried out on Monday by Nick and Yohann while I shaped the fore deck carlins. A glueing in session was then carried out on the various deck supporting structures on Tuesday evening. With all the components in place we then faired in the fore deck to the carlins by eye using a batten and the deck beams to the hull skin. This was carried out by Nick and myself while Yohann spiled in the ply for the aft sub deck. With it cut out and ready Yohann and myself glued it down late in the afternoon while Nick began painting the fore locker area with white two pack primer. Nick had cut out the opening for the locker door in the morning aswell. With a fair fore deck structure it was time then time to fit the marine ply sub decks. The fore deck was scribed and cut out during Thursday. The fore deck was laid in 5 pieces, one central piece, then two side pieces running into the carlins and two tiny pieces either side of the stem. With the ply all set in place and a glueing and clamping strategy all worked out we began our glueing session just after break and finished around 6:30. Aswell as epoxy glueing down the marine ply with epoxy and silica, all the timber deck structures the underside of the ply was also coated with epoxy resin. A total of 67 pumps of epoxy was used just to do the for deck. On friday we unclamped our deck and everything looked good and the clean up began. The width of the gunwhales were faired in a bit more closely to the stem at the same time.
We then began scribing and making templates for the covering boards and margin boards for the decks and had most of them finished by early friday evening. These will then allow an accurate order for mahogany to be made for making them and efficient use of material by nesting. We decided that the final capping/rubbing stake would be nice to be done in American White Oak to match the laid deck which will be oiled American White Oak with black Sikaflex pin stripes. The oak strips were ordered a couple of weeks ago and delivered last week. In between these jobs I had decided to double up the thickness of the floor members that will carry the lead keel as it is due for arrival next week. I also set up the lamination jig to make a laminated oak and mahogany tiller.
Material arrived this week for making the seats, seat risers and supports and material for the floors is to arrive next week aswell as the lead keek so next week should see things moving along well.