Untitled Document

Progress Report 6

Date	Whats been happening
Thursday 3 August 2000	Another quiet night, cut out hardboard templates for the underfloor frames and prepared the garage for popping off the second hull by cleaning out all the crap. Insulated the garage a bit better by gluing 25mm polystyrene sheets to the steel tilt-a-door.
Wednesday 2 August 2000	SIDE DECK - layed up the inner skin and vacuumed down the foam for the side deck for hull 2. Had a few spare sheets of polystyrene so built another "oven" around this and vacuumed and cooked the sidedeck at around 40 degrees. The team at Macduff industries were also busy, re-wiring the false floor to the stringer mould, and laminating up the second side of the sheets for the floor frames.
Tuesday 1 August 2000	LAYUP OUTER SKIN - Back into it with a vengance, a team of volunteers from the Auckland Javelin Squadron arrived in the garage to drink some beer and layup the outer skins on Hull 2. This went really well, with the 2 layers of 200g being applied in a few hours. After a few colder Auckland nights, a bit more heat has been required to start the resin curing process. The ADR240 resin is designed to operate at quite high temperatures, and requires a post cure at above 50 degrees to exact the best finished properties. Performing an initial cure at as high a temperature as possible will help the post curing process, and will result in the hull being more dimensionally stable during curing. A large number of polystyrene sheets, 2 x 1m, 50mm thick, were obtained to build an "oven" around the hull mould. This was setup for the cure last night, and with a 2400watt oil column heater the temperature reached 42 degrees, and averaged at around 39 degrees.
Monday 31 July 2000	Bit buggered, having a rest
Sunday 30 July 2000	HULL 1 - The big journey begins. The Holt Brothers, Steve and Pete arrive up from Wellington (10 hours driving) to take their new baby home... The foredeck is bolted on for the journey, and the false floor is fitted, but only taped in to allow a bit more work to take place in Wellington HULL 2 - Routered back foam where outer skin panels overlap ready for applying glass.
Saturday 29 July 2000	HULL 1 - Cut out false floor ready for inserting into the first hull. All the frames are now in ready to go.
Wednesday 26 July 2000	HULL 1 - Glued in the main beam forward, and the main bulkheads.
Tuesday 25 July 2000	SIDE DECK - Vacuumed down the first side deck. The inside skin of glass was laminated up about 4 weeks ago, so we have just been waiting for a bit of free time. The inside edge curvature on the decks is quite tight, so they are initially bent to shape using a heat gun, and vacuumed down into final shape.
Monday 24 July 2000	HULL 1 (Pete & Steves) - Glued in the 3 longitudonal frames behind the centrecase under the false floor. The frames are 80gm, 8mm Herex with a layer of 200g e-glass either side. When inserting the frames a sticky mixture of epoxy and microspheres / colloidal silica is used. The frames are tacked in place with a hot glue gun. HULL 1 FALSE FLOOR / BULKHEAD- Wired up the fase floor to the stringer mould ready for laminating, and laminated the second side of the main bulkhead. This bulkhead has two layers of 200gm e-glass either side. HULL 2 (Daves) - Removed the vacuum bag, and sanded back the hull foam ready for laying up the outer skin. Have a few gaps which need a small amount of bog and a few slivers of foam to fill but otherwise a good improvement in technique from the first hull.
Sunday 23 July 2000	HULL 1 - Sanded back the areas of the inside shell where the internal frames will sit with the trusty angle grinder. Attached the Transom (what a mission), and two transverse frames. The first in the middle of the cokpit where the mainsheet bridle is attached, and the other immediately behind the centrecase. HULL 1 FRAMES - Cutout all the frames for the first hull out of our laminated sheet of foam. Laminated the first side of the Main Bulkhead. The main bulkhead is laminated up with a piece of 8mm plywood replacing the foam where the chainplates are attached. HULL 2 - Sanded back the topsides foam, and the vacuum bagged down the hull bottom, and gunnale flange.
Saturday 22 July 2000	HULL 2 - Cut all the foam for the hull shell, as well as that for the shell of hull 3. Vacuum bagged down the topsides foam.
Friday 21 July 2000	HULL 1 - Popped the first hull off the mould. It came of reasonable easy, started from the back using wedges to pop the hull from the mould, and worked around the gunnales until finally freeing enough of the hull to pop it up and off. Dropped the hull into the building cradle. HULL 2 & HULL 3 - Cut all the fibreglass for laying up the second and third hull shells. Waxed up the hull mould ready for boat two.
Thursday 20 July 2000	Glued the stringers on the false floor mould, bogged the centrecase mould a bit more and had an early night. Charging the batteries for a big weekend.
Wednesday 19 July 2000	FALSE FLOOR - Started assembling the false floor stringer mould. HULL 1 - Chopped the stem back to final length, and reinforced with some 400g double bias cloth. SIDE DECK - Built "ye olde medieval foam turture machine", or in other words a small shaped mould to bend the foam over for the side deck moulds. The mould holds the foam in place while it is bent using a heatgun into the final shape. Tweak is very excited about using this mould.
Tuesday 18 July 2000	HULL CRADLE - Built a "box" cradle around the firt hull on the mould. The cradle is constructed of 16mm MDF (yes, we still have a few sheets left), and is epoxy glued to the two fibreglass supports that were laminated over the hull shape. This structure will be used to hold the hull in shape when it is popped off the mould in a few days.
Monday 17 July 2000	Auckland Javelin Squadron - Committee Meeting
Sunday 16 July 2000	HULL 1 - Built a long table down at our second site (Macduff Industries) and laminated two sheets of 8mm Herex foam together for cutting the internal frames and bulkheads out of. The frames have a single layer of 200g glass on either side. FOREDECK 2 - Removed the vacuum bag from this deck, sanded the surface fair to get rid of the resin/glue forced through the breathing holes. Routered a grove down the centre to take the fibreglass overlap from each side and laminated up the two top layers of 200g glass. FOREDECK 3 - Cutout a foam, and fibreglass kitset for the last foredeck. FALSE FLOOR - Cutout the frames and supports for a simple stringer false floor mould. This mould will be convex and will be used to laminate up the inside skin before the false floor is fitted to the hull. The top skin of the concave floor is laminated with the floor in the boat.
Saturday 15 July 2000	THE BIG MOVE - Started moving all of the deck moulds and assorted space grabbing stuff out of the workshop and down to our secondary building zone. This is Macduff Industries, workplace of the famous "Tweak" Macduff, crew on the Night Nurse. HULL 1 - This was the big day for laminating the outside skins of the first hull. Day started with cutting out the glass. Outside laminate is 2 x 200g eGlass. The hull is too wide to allow the glass to be run length wise, so it is run across the boat, with a 1mm deep indent routered into the hull where the panels overlap. The theory here, is that its easier to fill a slight hollow where the glass joins than sand it back and damage the surrounding laminate. After routering, and sweeping back the hull the foam surface is primed with a light epoxy bog to fill in the small gaps holes in the foam. This helps to minimise weight as the epoxy bog is lighter than filling the holes with resin. Finally the glass layers were added, starting at the most difficult bit, the stem, and working towards the back. Our laminating technique is getting quicker, and hopefully better. The correct weight of resin is poured on the area being laminated, a squegee is used to spread it out in an even film, the glass cloth is dropped on, and finally a roller and squeege is used to bring the resin through the glass and get an even laminate.
Friday 14 July 2000	FOREDECK 2 - Vacuum bagged the foam onto the second foredeck
Thursday 13 July 2000	CENTRE CASE - Started building a simple mould for building the centrecase structure over. The mould is slightly tapered to allow for easy release, and is again built of chipboard, and laminated in 200g glass.
Wednesday 12 July 2000	Writing August article for Sailing New Zealand magazine.
Tuesday 11 July 2000	Auckland Sailing Club - Committee Meeting
Monday 10 July 2000	HULL 1 - Removed bag, and netting from the hull. Sanded back foam surface ready for glassing. Foam is sanded back with longboards and 80 grit paper. Main reason for sanding is to remove any glue/bog that has bled through the air holes in the foam. Patched up a few areas where to foam was not able to be vacuumed down properly. Bogged down the gunnale cove ready for glassing.
Sunday 9 July 2000	HULL 1 - Attached foam on bottom of hull and on gunnale. The gunnale is constructed of 20mm, 100 gram CoreCell foam. We have made it nice and thick to give the crew something decent to trapeze from. While the foam is being vaccumed down, we cover the entire mould in a tent and heat the area to get the resin curing faster. This also means we dont have to run the vaccum pump all night. Fore Deck 2 - Applied inside glass skin to the mould Side Deck 1 - Applied inside glass skin to the mould.
Saturday 8 July 2000	HULL 1 - Cut topsides foam into shape. Topsides are constructed of 800 gram 10mm Herex foam. Drilled holes in foam for vacuum bagging (this lets air trapped under the foam escape) and started constructing the bag. The vaccum bag is made of a large sheet of plastic and is taped together with a black vacuum tape. Primed the topsides foam, and topsides of the mould with a glue/bog, and attached the sides.
Friday 7 July 2000	HULL 1 - Glassed inside skin onto the hull mould. The inside skin is a single layer of 200g e-glass. We cant remember what else we did, but we finsihed this at 1.30am so we must have been pretty busy at some stage.

Old Progress Updates
To see more progress reports from the start of the project look at the old progress reports