Transom Fiberglass Fun

The book states (paraphrasing) that when you're 'glassing the transom, the end is in sight.  Well, behold my end!  This one is a bit darker though not any less shiny. 

I plan to keep this bright except for some trim around the edges.  The trim will be about the width of the rub rails all around.  I wish I could keep the whole thing bright but I had to glob up some filler for some of the corners at the transom skirt back in the day.  The rest of it is really pretty.  I think it's sapele if I remember right, real wood not the marine ply, so its rich hues shine through.  I've been researching marine decal makers so we'll see how that goes.

It does feel pretty good to get this done as I wasn't sure how to pull this off, given the transom has been sitting on a couple tires for about 5 years with nothing supporting it otherwise.  So, a visit to a generic hardware store and $40 later got me two small jacks which I used to lift the end enough to gain access to the transom skirt.  I used a couple small boards of padauk to protect the boat from the jack.  They're also both on furniture dollies so I can move the boat around if needed.

As I write that last sentence, I have glossed over the sheer terror I felt when I was underneath this 1,000lb object with nothing supporting it except the two generic jacks.  An inadvertent kick and I'd be a pancake, or at least trapped in the cockpit.  No kidding -- I checked to be sure I had my phone just in case.  I think I'll visit a big box store tomorrow to get a couple cinderblocks for more permanent and safer support.

But with the boat off the ground I also noticed a potential problem.  Years ago, I fixed a mis-measure at the companionway entrance, and right in the same spot where it's been sitting on a tire for awhile the entrance is bowed a bit, bending in towards the cabin.  I'm not sure how I'd go about fixing this;  I'm hoping that now that it's relieved of pressure it'll reshape itself.  It's not that bad, but it's noticeable, at least to my eye.  Nothing I can do about it now except to continue with the bottoms up part of the build.  When I re-flip it I'll be able to see how bad it is.  In the meantime, the support point is now the anchor locker which is a far better place for it to be.

With no way to fix that, I went ahead and did the transom.  I was able to get some 'glass on the transom skirt at the same time, bringing the 'glass around the bend a few inches up.  This wasn't easy to do and I almost regretted the effort as I could've just stopped at the bend and sanded it clean later.  But I figured I'd give it a try.  I had to cut a small dart right in the  middle but otherwise it wasn't too bad and it'll be a good strong joint when I double this up on the flip.  I was also able to double up on the sides, too, and got those down.  Without breaking my arm too much, I've got the 'glass thing down pretty well by now -- just in time not to ever have to do it again.

With some extra epoxy on the cup, I also dropped a couple strips of 6oz 'glass where the transom meets the bottom of the hull.  I'll add a couple strips on either side of those once they cure.  I was also able to finish most of the reinforcements around the chine, keel, and bow.  Here's a section where two bits of 6oz 'glass meet.  There's another 4 layers of 4oz 'glass underneath this so I feel pretty good about the strength here.  Except for maybe a bulky look when painting I don't think you can go wrong with too many reinforcements.

One challenge I had with all the thin strips of 6oz 'glass was figuring out how to lay the frog tape as I couldn't get the width just right as the keel and everything else changes shape over its length.  I was eyeballing it most of the time and then realized that I could just use a small bit of it and have an actual size template against which to place the tape.  Wow, wish I noticed that earlier as it would've saved a few yards of tape.  So now I can just run this little guy along the tape and see if I sized it right.

I'm aiming to get all the 'glass work done in a couple days so I can start with the epoxy layers, but I'll need more epoxy to do that, so CLC gets my credit card again.  Pouring money into a boat I may not even get to sail is really depressing!

Canaries in a Coal Mine - Transom Prep 3

Another PocketShip builder (Jon) talks about his metaphorical canary to gauge how much time's been spent building versus other hobbies. Miners took canaries into the shafts with them to test for gas. (Some of them got pick axes, too, but they were terrible workers.)

Apparently, canaries are much more susceptible to gas than humans are, so if the bird keeled over, it was time to head to the surface. In Jon's case, it was violin proficiency. In my case, it's bagpipe practice. For all I know, Jon's bird is still alive. Mine has long since crumbled into a pile of feathers and mulch.

I haven't picked up the pipes in about 2 months, favoring boatbuilding over most other winter hobbies. I've been forced (in a good way) to pull out the practice chanter and work on some St. Patrick's tunes. I don't do the parades and bars anymore, but I do work with a Dropkick Murphy cover band that plays tunes like An Irish Pub Song, Shipping Up to Boston, and a not-your-grandmother's Amazing Grace.

That means PocketShip progress has been slow. Some days, it's walking into the garage, staring at the transom, and walking back out. Other days, like yesterday, it was cutting a 9" cleat and letting it sit with some epoxy on it. Speaking of epoxy, one task I had to do before anything else was replacing the 5 gallon resin jug. There was still some left in the old jug, so I poured the remnants into the new one. If progress can be measured by material use, then there's been some progress. Granted, half the jug wound up on the shop floor, or scraped off the tiller, or in various globs around the house, but some of it actually made it onto the boat. There's a lot left in the build, but I should have enough to finish.

New resin jug. Hard to believe.

Some little things to address included the final board for the sole. I'd stripped too much wood from the cleat so had to refill it with epoxy and drill the board back in. The sole is officially planked and finished. I'll need to do some touch up work just before launch (some minor sanding and varnish) but that'll wait until much later.

Had to refill holes to redo the last plank.

The sole is done!

Finishing the sole was a bit anti-climatic. From hauling the padauk home to the final plank installed, it was about 10 months. From ripping the first plank, about 6 months. I really like the way it came out - it's stunning, actually - and I'm surprised this is a product of my handiwork. But it was a long way to get here with the accent boards, lift out design, and angles. This was one of those high effort, high reward things, like college, but I wouldn't want to go back. I'm ready to move on.

I also finished up the port speaker box. Keen readers will recall I dry fit these last time. They're now installed with epoxy and drywall screws. It's flush all around and watertight. The backer was installed just outboard of the top cleat that forms the frame for the laz hatch. That's important for how the laz floor is going to work. A very small hole is visible in the upper right where the wires will power the speakers. I'll also install a bus bar at the upper right corner of the backing to carry the port side wires under the footrest and to the starboard side, where it will carry forward to the battery. This is needed because I didn't think ahead enough to leave a few more feet of wire.

I'm slightly concerned about how the current will affect the speaker; will I get a buzz? Not sure, but not really many options right now.

Screwed and glued and watertight port side speaker box. Will also be the bus bar surface.

View from the cabin. The angle of the screw holes annoys me even in this photo.

View from the top. You can see the extra blocking added for the speaker depth. There's about 1/2" clearance now.

Starboard always gets the dregs, and here again is no exception. I epoxy'd the last cleat in place and will wait for that to cure before installing the backing later this afternoon. This one was a little finicky as the bottom cleat (for the laz floor) was a slightly different size than the others, so had to taper the speaker box cleat. Came out fine, just a little work to get right. It gave me an excuse to try the tapering jig, which will be important when I do the scarfs for the rubrails. Man! There's a lot to this boat.

Starboard speaker box lagging behind.

I worked with the footwell sort of dry fit. This was to ensure I wasn't off on the dimensions and to understand how to run the wires.

Footwell dry fit. Nice clean lines. This is one pretty boat.

A couple things to note. There will be flotation under the floorboard, and indeed under the laz floors, too. Some of that space under the floorboard is taken up by the bilge pump and the wiring conduits, so I'll need a little extra flotation to make up for the cubic foot or so I'll lose for those things. Given I'll have both port and aft side electrical needs, I need to be sure I can run wires back and forth under this without causing a mess. I also need to be sure I have access to everything. That means I won't have 100% coverage on the laz floor but really just the area between the inboard speaker box edge and the footwell itself. I'll have a short baffle (for lack of a better word) that will sit vertically between the footwell side and the hull. It's a good compromise, I think. But we'll see how it works in practice. Pictures later will help anyone who's confused, including me.

A side project I've been working on is a redo of the dashboard. With a little time and energy, I recut the pattern and added some extra flair to the border. I don't think it'll be installed until I turn the boat back over, but at least it'll be ready when that time comes. Now, back to the pipes!

Speakers 2 - Aft Speaker Boxes

Tonight was one of those nights when not a lot went right. I wanted to make some progress on the transom area so that I can finally drop the cockpit decking down, but it's slow going. I started out with some wiring. All the wires back there except the horn/bilge now have terminals. Everything's official - Ancor marine wire with heat shrink tubing.

Rear wiring done except for the bus bars and bilge pump.

That left a pretty hefty check list, still:

• Build speaker boxes
• Install bilge pump (haven't gotten it yet)
• Run wiring and bus bars
• Build laz "floors"
• Prep and paint

As a work colleague would say, the long pole in the tent is the speaker box build. I started by applying a nice layer of epoxy on the circle cut outs that house the speakers. That went ok, and I wiped up any runners before it would affect either the paint or the transom. But even then, I realized I only had one latex glove left so had to be really careful not to muck up my exposed fingers. A quick run to the Big Box Store solved that. (I checked on my lumber order while there. It's still a week away.)

I then measured and cut the cleats that would form the frame of the speaker box. The speakers I have are low profile, but they still jut in about 1 1/2". Allowing another 1/2" for the sound and fury, I'm looking at a 1 3/4" frame with 1/4" backer. The problem is in my rush to put down the laz cleats for the floors some weeks ago, I grabbed whatever I had available. That meant the bottom cleats are a different size than the top cleats. Oops...

The speaker cleats started life as a block of pine lying around the shop. Actually, they started life as a pine tree, but who cares about that.

Block o' pine. Not sure where this came from.

Block o' pine ready for duty.

I assured a dry fit then epoxy'd them up.

Fits pretty good.

Epoxy'd and cleated. This will be watertight.

I drilled a hole in the inboard cleat to run the speaker wire out. This is now filled with epoxy but I'll drill a smaller hole. This is of course to prevent seepage back here. I'm not real happy with the close ups of epoxy runs under the cleats, but not much I can do (or more importantly, want to do) about it. This is the sealed up, watertight, non-visible area of the transom. I would've liked to be more conscientious here, but wasn't.

Something to note is that the manual asks to put the cleats that ride on BH 8 facing inside the cabin. If I did that, I'd have internal speaker boxes and given much more attention to the squeezeout. In any case, I think it's much better to face these inside the laz vs. inside the cabin.

Well, watertight except for the hole I've drilled for the speaker wire. But if water gets up that high, seriously...

I then found some marine ply scrap and cut the backer. I dry fit this and it looks good. But I want to epoxy this on both sides before installing it. This will be glued and screwed to become a permanent part of the build tomorrow. Some folks wondered how I'd make aft speakers watertight. Well, here it is.

Backer fitted. There will still be plenty of room in the laz for assorted junk.

Some fancy jiggering got the port box done and acceptable, but the starboard side is a bit off. I got tired of trying to fit cleats so I quit for the night. One of these days, both sides will be even.