Friday, April 22, 2011

Boat building tips I have learnt.

These comments are in no particular order and will be put down as I think of them. I hope they will be useful to some others who follow as I have found Blogs such as Perry Burton and Rick Corless.
* Epoxy mixing: To mix small quanities (which is most of the time) I use the lids of soft drink bottles or lids of old resin containers. They are cheap and available.
*  To clean your hands after a messy epoxy job I scrub them with clean sand and dishwashing detergent. Very effective.
* Making gains: Measure back 400mm from the stem and taper both the upper and lower plank with an angle grinder. Tidy up with a rabbet plane.
* As you may have noticed I have installed the planking on the frames by turning the boat upside down after the stringers were installed, this has been a real plus and I would strongly recommend it. As long as you strenghten the frames with some internal timber to prevent any distortion there should be no problems.
* I used Construction grade plywood for all of my build. In Australia see if you can get the Chilean Construction Plywood, from Bunnings, as it is a better grade than the local product. If there are some knots that have fallen out just fill them with epoxy, good as new.