Clippercraft lowering kit

Nov 27, 2009

Some of us are extremely lucky out here in the real world, getting the opportunity to work on major national holidays. Due to the shift on turkey day, I wasn't able to post photos immediately of the fiberglassing forward in the cabin, so this post will be a twofold endeavor into the shop.

Late in the day on the 25th, a combination of free time and weather completed a great 3 day shot of wet on wet epoxy work. This time of year, any epoxy that has been laid within the previous 24 hours isn't completely cured, which allows it to bond molecularly, creating a one piece adhesive assembly. Highly recommended not only for strength, but for saving sanding time.

The shape of the hull laps required doing the layup in 2 pieces. I made a fillet and laid in 12 oz 45/45 biax glass bedded in epoxy, but split the tape at the lap. I then backed in a bunch of filler to bond the lap, and used excess neat epoxy to make little fills, making the lap area level and watertight.

Here is a secondary shot, showing the depth of the monstrous storage spaces afforded by this assembly.

This was left over Thanksgiving to cure up, stiffen the hull, and absorb as many calories as its owner.

My parents had arrived last night, bringing with them from Oregon a set of cradles which this boat is quite familiar with. She was once sitting on them in the past, when the previous owner had her in the shop for work. I had told him then that I wanted the cradles, and that I would someday own them, but he didn't add them in. Lo and behold, he put them up for sale and guess who bought them? Heh...

Thanks to Ron down the lake allowing me to borrow some foam blocks to crib her up, she was destined to be off the trailer by the end of the day. My scalp was tingling in anticipation of not being beaten into the rafters of the shop constantly.

Out comes the foam, floor jack, some clamps and braces, and the 6x6's.

Poof, trailer magically disappears from hovering hull

Now that she's on the substantially lower cradles, I have a hand's thickness from my tremendous noggin to what I can only compare to the gladiators of the roof truss world, seeking out my scalp at all costs.

Unbelievable difference, it will take time to get used to not hunching over constantly to work, but man I love that space. The boat is also willing to scoot side to side at a whim, moves around the shop without effort, and puts everything at a much easier to work height.

Well, it isn't that late in the day, let's rehang the cabin side mocks...

The budget allowance worked out to pick up a radar this week as well. Sold my trackday suit from my Ducati riding days earlier in the year, creating the cash to pick up a used Furuno 1830 24 mile radar. Im glad to have this big piece of safety equipment prepped and ready to go in the boat as soon as she's ready for a lid.

Doesn't it look like she's ready for some serious business?

Quick update

Nov 24, 2009

To be extra thorough on the documentation of this process, I will pop in with today's progress. I can't recommend enough to use commercial icing bags for baking as disposable epoxy guns. They made this process much faster than usual.

The two panels are in, screws are set to hold the filler/butt block in place, and keep the two sides bedded together.

Whilst that project went quickly, why not get the other bits ironed out as well, as the gloves are still sticky. I made up blocking of 6mm ply and 6" wide boards to create a bedding surface for storage hatches. A little scrap from the inner cutout portions utilized the rest of the single sheet of ply necessary to make the bunk tops.

In conclusion for the day, I just thought I would show what it takes to hold down panels in this operation. Don't hesitate to grab electrical tools such as grinders as weights. They have tremendous density for their size, so they do a good job of holding the panel in place.

Tomorrow, fiberglass...

Extra Strength Clippercraft

Nov 23, 2009

It appears as though there has been a bit of a delay in getting to the keys for this installment. My apologies, but you must understand a little something about your most unruly narrator. Whilst I do have a compulsory boat building habit, I have also been skiing almost all of my life. Literally, only missing 2 years, mainly due to my inability to get out of the cradle or car seat. The snow has fallen early, and the ski areas have started turning the bull wheels, so I will be skiing from time to time. I refuse to apologize...

This trip into the shop will be a bit of a seminar on putting in an eggcrate style substructure to strengthen your 23/26 Clippercraft. I think this is a great mod, and one that should reduce the likelihood of some of the known leaking and weeping of seams.

I had lost my filleting tools, so an hour or so was taken to build some. All you need to do is take a hole saw to some scrap (in this case lauan plywood), cut a few different sized rounds (1/2" and 3/4" seen here), and glue them to another scrap for a handle. Keep them small so you can run a fillet anywhere in the boat.

Next I grabbed a couple botched offcuts from the cabin side nailer. These had a near-perfect angle to glue to the side of the hull for where the bunk tops meet the hull planking. 6" bits are a good size, as they glue readily to the hull and don't need too much thickened epoxy.

After ensuring the boat is level (it has been for some time now), grab a 4 foot level and use it across your bracing, marking a line where it touches the hull planking. A permanent marker is best.

Once everything is marked, make sure your hull planking is either sanded back to good solid wood or you have roughed up the sound epoxy coating. Now mix up some good peanut-butter consistency thickened epoxy (I like pine dust and silica) and stick the 6" bits to the hull sides along the line. I use blue 1/2" masking tape to hold them in place for the 30 min or so it takes for the epoxy to set.

As those are in place, this is also a good time to add in any remaining nailers or bracing available. I had some filler left over, so I clamped in the remaining support.

24 hours later, everyone seems to be nice and cured up, so it's time to rip off the tape and see how strong it all is.

The lines looked a little wonky to me at first, but it turns out I had 3 different thicknesses of supports in there, so they look a bit odd. After setting some wood on them, they are going to be within the 1/4" gap filling ability of the epoxy, so we charge ahead.

Luckily I had purchased the right amount of plywood earlier in the year for my cabin project. I made a template of the cabin top shape out of lauan, roughed it in, and laid down the lines on 6mm okoume mahogany ply. This first panel required a bit more fitting, which resulted in a decent gap tolerance to the hull. I used that panel to mark out the second (both from a single sheet of ply), and laid it in for fitting. The second panel required adjustment as well. After much fiddling, I managed to get them both in and lined up in a position that was well supported.

In all likelihood, this thing is going to be almost expansive in comparison with the boat we fish out of now. The seam down the middle will be butt blocked with plywood, then filled with epoxy filler to a smooth finish. Later trimming gives each bunk side 22" of width and 7' of length without the center panel in place.

Next up was a long free day with good weather, so out came the epoxy. In a very common moment of absentmindedness, I left the bottom of the longitudinal panels free to roam about the hull. Solution? Filler, fillet tools. This should be ridiculously stout, as I filled the area between the 5/8" stringer and the panel completely, adding a good deal of laterall stiffness, but leaving a small scupper in the event of water penetration.

We have strong, we have supported, we have storage, let's make it all waterproof. All surfaces had been coated by the previous owner with CPES, a good base. To this I added 2 coats of neat (unthickened) epoxy, as well as a couple coats on all the new materials. Anything that isn't a gluing surface must be coated at this point, or we will be reaching through holes to do it.

After a shift at the station, I scooted home today to get the bunk tops prepped for installation tomorrow. A couple coats of epoxy wet on wet will keep the panels in good shape, while getting a good bond with the filled epoxy I will use tomorrow.

Seeing more weather window and family coming to town for the Thanksgiving holiday weekend, the bunk tops MUST be in tomorrow, allowing them to be glassed to the hull the day after, and creating one of the stiffest Clippercraft bow assemblies in existence. She's staring to feel more like a boat every day, with the cabin superstructure in the very near future.

Undue stresses

Nov 13, 2009

So after a few swearing fits today, some progress was made on the boat. Noting the onset of cooler weather, I'm trying to get the bulk of the fab done in relatively mild shop temps. Instead of the back and forth of messing with the mockups aft, I went full steam towards the bow.

The drawings and measurements I have been offered by other Clippercraft owners show the bow bunk tops at 7' corner to corner against the bulkhead, so I targeted this length. Using some eyeballing, sticks, a level, and some hot glue, 3 shapes were generated. The new A bulkhead, the bunk side, and the bunk top half. I can't recommend enough to people that buying cheap $10 lauan plywood is the way to go for templating. It goes very fast, can be used as a rapid prototype, and translates measurements very well.

Photos are a bit limited because I would work until absolutely stopped by outside forces (read: loving wife preparing dinner), so I didn't take great documentation. My apologies.

In the following shots, it is clear to see that the mahogany plywood is already in place. These two shots are the dry fit phase:

The fit wasn't amazing, but it was adequate. After talking at length with my friend Michael B., it was settled that the support should be glued to 3/4" x 3/4" framing (nailers, etc) on the inside corners, with a fillet and tape approach on the visible edges. This gives the best of both worlds. Big gluing strength on the surfaces of the 3/4" stock, with the cleanability of the filleted surfaces.

This afternoon, after destroying 2 drill bits, without ever touching drill to wood, dropping the camera off the boat, and bashing my thumb with a hammer (that never gets old), the A bulkhead and seat sides went in.

These parts went in with relative ease, but are not 100% square. I will fiddle with them a bit once the edges are set.

What isn't shown are the roughed-out bunk tops. The coming week will see an edge developed along the hull sides with CVG fir, making a ledger for the seat tops to rest against and glue up to. This will cover one side, while the upper edge will be filleted and taped to the hull. The bow will then be a giant box-sectioned egg crate, making it substantially stronger than the factory Clippercraft setup.The timeline is still holding well to see cabin sides raising in December, with interior fit-out coming after Christmas, and hopefully rigging by March. Stay tuned to see the progress!

Clippercraft 2, thumb, 1.

Nov 3, 2009

Though the temperature has been dropping substantially, this project isn't stuck in the weather gridlock that the previous boat was. I now have a couple of heaters in the shop (adding another soon, and returning the pressure tank heater to its rightful place for the winter) and can do glue-ups pretty much with impunity.

I returned from shift this morning to my bride telling me there was Lake Booty to be had. It appeared that a canoe has been living free-range on the lake for 2 days now, so we went and collected it. Afterwards I finally mustered the enthusiasm to get out in the shop and get to work.

After last session, the bulkhead was due up next. The shape had been roughed out, fitted, and a door needed to be ironed out. Using a little bit of Dave Gerr's text, I decided on a 24" wide opening. This was comfortable to get in and out of, left plenty of meat for the bulkhead to add strength to the hull, and seemed to fit well. The height was my own doing as well. The bottom of the opening received an extra 6" of height instead of being at sole level. This should keep a modicum of safety if we slop a wave, hopefully preventing water from reaching the bilges. I also left some meat on top, around 4". This allowed for a 3 piece mahogany frame across the top, adding more strength, giving a nailer, and a very tough surface in the event we take a wave hard to the bow.

As the photos of a hole cut in plywood were midly uninteresting, I skipped forward to the actual installation for this installment's images. Here is the bulkhead from aft:

Another view:

Here is the cabin side of the bulkhead showing the bracing. I used some mahogany scrap that was laying around the shop holding dust off the floor. The 3 pieces were rough cut with the circular saw, then planed back to the correct shape for the curvature. All in all, very pleasant work.

Once the epoxy is set, it will be on to building out the cabin sides and beginning the v-berth setup and build out.

Bulkhead set up, Clippercraft style cabin sides mocked

Oct 31, 2009

Finally a few days to think! There are no trips on the horizon, just some mediocre weather and a large task at hand.

The documentation from Roger has been nothing less than fantastic. The new sides will be very similar to his, 133" in length, 22" or thereabouts tall at the aft end, and all minimizing tophamper. Im still detailing the angles of the front to make sure it is visually pleasing, but that will be settled later next month. The measurements gave me a gorgeous, straight line cabin side which aligns with the point of the bow. I think it is more appealing than the previous mockups.

First off on our photo tour today is the now-trimmed bulkhead. Using Roger's numbers, the bulkhead height was set at 17 1/2" above the side decks, with a 5" elevation change for the curve. The seam ended up a little off-center, but that's just due to the fitting out of the two panels. Safer to make one cut instead of two when mating straight panels.

Here you can see the cabin side shape mocked. It definitely looks better than my mock previously, as it spreads the cabin's apparent shape over much more of the sheer curve and length of the boat.

Having those up made me lose a little bit of time because I needed to visualize the helm and seating areas to get an appropriate cabin length. I think Roger's 133" number should work well, but it may get changed a bit once the tanks show up and I can see where and how much of the seating area and/or cockpit are going to be available.

A shot or two was taken to get an idea in my head, and of course the world's, of where and how it will lay out

Seat box height is set at 27", 10" taller than the fuel tanks, and about where I think it needs to be with a captain's chair on top of it for comfort and visibility.

That configuration puts the cabin side at 133", which leaves 6 full feet of fish deck from cabin side to aft bulkhead/transom. Other than the 32" x 32" motor box, its a 42 square foot fishing deck with full reachover at the transom and sides.

Today there will be some assisting the neighbor with a repair on his boat, fishing for a while, and attempting to get the 3/4" x 3/4" nailer placed on the gunnels to prepare for the cabing going 3 dimensional. Stay tuned!