Freedom!

With the boat shining, it's time to remove it from the mold. With our process, this means cutting the gunwales just above the staples. I traced a line where I thought the staples were with a magic marker, then followed with a trim saw. I was worried about marking the newly finished hull, so I covered the trim saw in blue tape. Then, with a utility knife I finished the job. And with a little re-cutting of a few stray staples, freedom!

Finishing Touches

Well, it worked! The veneer is attached, and now it's time to pull all those staples, and to sand!

Just don't get too carried away, otherwise you'll sand right though, and it'll look like this...

Once the sanding is done, and you've convinced your apprentice/dad that he needs to put the sander down comes the most rewarding part of the process, seeing the boat shine. To finish the hull, we used West System 207 epoxy. This has a built in UV protector which will keep the epoxy from going bad. The hull was wiped down, and then the painting began.

Yeah, it looks like that. We put several coats on, so expect to be at this stage for a few days.

Buisness Time - Day 3

The final layer of veneer is place length wise, running with the water line. I couldn't figure out a better way of doing this, so I followed the Gougeon Brother's advice, and stapled the veneer down to the hull. Rather than using plastic for this final layer, they recommend scraps of veneer, as the plastic is supposed to mark the wood somehow. I'm not sold on that. What I did learn though, is that you have to make a choice, and make it right now. Do you want the water line to be perfectly straight, or do you want to get this thing done easily. If easy is your choice. Then start at the keel, and work your way down to the gunwales. If you're obsessed with aesthetics, which I must admit I was, then start at the gunwales, and work your way out to the keel. The problem with the later one is that by the time you get to the keel, the veneer is twisting so wildly that even staples every few inches can't keep it flat to the hull.

The problem really arrises when the two sides meet each other. Now you've got all these strange shaped pieces you need to cut, or as we tried, overlap and then sand. I really think that if you start in the center you'll have yourself a lot of trouble, and it'll look awesome, don't worry.

Because I think we love the plastic wrap we wrapped the whole boat once done, pulling extra tight. Well that's it, hopefully tomorrow it'll be ready to unwrap, and oh yeah, the epoxy turned redish this time.

Transport

Most of you wont have to do this step, but I was building the boat on Nantucket Island, and running out of time before heading to Berkeley, and was getting worried that the boat would get left like a boat project -- undone.

So, we wrapped up the boat, and shipped it to Amherst, where I tried to finish it before leaving.

You'd be surprised how many stupid faces I can make.

There's another one.

And with that, the boat was loaded onto a bigger boat.

I actually got to fulfil a huge dream of mine, which was to have my own boat on the roof of the van. When I first got into rowing I saw a VW driving down the highway with a beautiful yellow Empacher on the roof. Well, today I got to have my own boat, and it's not yellow, it's wood!

Sad Day

This is where I admit the truth. Don't drink and Epoxy. They don't mix.

When the epoxy is mixed correctly, it turns a nice shade of red. No red, not enough hardener.

That's what happened. Luckily Jeremy Norwood, a surfboard builder among other things, recommended making a new batch of epoxy extra stiff on the hardener, spreading it on, and then hoping that it would kick off the goo beneath it. It worked, but it was a lot of work, not to mention sanding.

Buisness Time - Day 2

The plans call for three layers of veneer, and a calico (?) cloth between the second and third. I'm not sure what that is. I spent some time online and found that it's a type of fabric. But, why would you put fabric in your boat? Anyway, we want this baby to be light, fast, and strong, and not silky smooth, so we're going to use some fiberglass. But before we get there, we need to prep the surface. That means sanding, and lots of it.

Materials:

4oz fiberglass. 10 yards by 30 inches. Purchased from US composites. It wasn't too expensive, but the shipping was though.

Tools:

Random Orbit sander (With vacuum attachment! Please, figure something out if you have to)

Lots of sandpaper

It takes a long time to sand this whole boat smooth. The epoxy doesn't sand very well, so be prepared to use some tough grit, I'm talking 40 grit.

I had to take the jacket off, it was getting tiring. Once it's nice and smooth, it's time to lay down the fiberglass. Wow did this look cool. I did a dry lay up, where I draped the fiberglass onto the hull without any epoxy. Then once it was set, I rolled epoxy onto the fiberglass.

Now you see it...

Now you don't!