Bulkhead out and Templates

Here is the bow of the boat without the bulkhead....roomy! I took the saggy remains and traced it onto some luan ply to make a new template. I also modified the shape to accomodate a fiberglass tube and some struts to the deck. It fits! While I was at the boat today, I also checked the NACA 64A010 profile against the keel...it fits perfectly!

Keel Dilemma

Well, I've been making some keel measurements and looking at the previous botched fairing job/s. It appears that the keel is attempting to be a NACA 64A-009 series foil...maybe a little thicker. This is based on making some measurements and plotting against known keel profiles in excel. I also used a neat shareware program called Profili that does some neat plotting and has a large library of standard profiles. The root of the keel (top 1/8) is clearly fatter than the rest and way out of profile...the rest is not half bad. In investiagting if the root could be thinned to match profile, I started drilling test holes down to the lead...yep, most can be thinned out.....then I found the interesting part. The fairing in the picture I had thought was just glass left over from removal of some of the chord. It is filled with foam core (Klegecell), the same stuff the rest of the boat is made of....I probed it and it appears to be the hull core and goes straight to the inner skin. Ow! now to figure out how to deal with that...

Pulpit Off

Took the bow pulpit off and the track on the forward deck. The bolts in the deck track were fused to the bolts, so I ended up shearing them all off. The deck under the pulpit is a disaster....yep, good thing I decided to fix this:

2006 Haul Out

Hauled the Lobster out today, bottom paint is still in good shape and it came out clean. Still have about the same number of blisters as when it went in...will take care of some more of them over the winter. Also, here is a photo of the forward bulkhead that's going to be replaced:

Last Race of 2006

Here are a couple of shots from the last Frostbite race of 2006.....we ended up 4th out of 19, not bad all in all. :)

End of 2006

Well, it's the end of the 2006 season and we've had a ton of fun (and learned a lot while doing it). Thanks to everyone who came out with us this year to make the Rock Lobster a rockin place to hang out. Now begins the list of things to repair, upgrade, and modify in preparation for next year. :) 1st up, we've ordered a new main sail from Quantum on Solomon's Island. We ordered early and got great 'boat show' pricing. Nothing special this time, just their Dacron racing main with 1 full batten, 3 partials, and a reef. Our old North 3DL main has 4 hard years on it and it's time to go! Now for the list of things planned (there may be more too):
Fix any new blisters :(
Fix the trailing edge of the keel (way to fat) - I have a plan :)
Redo the forward bulkhead to make it stiffer - it still has too much flex up there
Reglass the deck around the bow pulpit - years old damage there that leaks
Rebed the windows - again :(
Add a 'bar of doom' like on the Soverel 33s.
Redo a bulkhead under the cockpit - it's a partial that clearly needs to be bigger.

-all for now, K out!

Backers

Here are some shots of the backers for the clutches and traveler. They are made of cutting board material, which is easy to shape.

Shine

I was happy to see the reflection of the keel on the bottom after doing the paint. I still have some sanding to do, but this was a nice start:

Hole

Did I say I was changing out my paddlewheel? I glassed the core before installing the new unit. This is what is in there:

Before and After

Took a while, but the bottom is finally almost sorted out. Two coats of Pettit Vivid thinned with xylol at double the suggested rate applied with a foam trim roller and it's pretty smooth.

Blisters Sealed

Was too cold to do too much today. Here are the blisters all filled in and sanded smooth, along with the spots of Rustlok Steel Primer 6980 to seal them.

Lobster Tail

Whoohoo! Put a little blue paint (Blue Vivid was on sale this week) around the rudder tube and installed the rudder. I think this will look pretty cool when I'm done. Boat will be bright blue and the foils yellow. :)

Bottom Update

Been a while since I made a post, but still been working hard. I keep forgetting my camera. Got to be done soon, as races start on 19 March....just a few short weeks left. I must be in the water by the 17th!! Bottom blisters are all filled and sanded smooth, just need to seal the repairs prior to paint. Hole has been enlarged to accomodate a new paddlewheel transducer. Seats are done. Traveler needs to be installed. Keel needs a little fairing and the whole boat needs paint. I've got the rudder in the garage and started painting it there. Using PETIT VIVID (in yellow). I'm spraying the rudder to see how smooth I can get this stuff, but the boat will need to be painted by roller or pad. I thinned the paint with Xylene to the max limit on the label to make it easier to spray. I'm running 45lbs pressure on 100' hose to a 'Harbor Freight' touch up sprayer. :)

Started the port side

The port side only had a 12" square delaminated area. This should be much easier to do than the other side was. :)

Final layer of glass / carbon....

Weather was good again (~45 this morning), so I decided to lay up the final layers of 3K carbon fiber and 14.5 oz glass. The final count is 1 strip 8" 6K carbon fiber as a stiffener under the traveler, 1 layer overlapped 12" 14.5oz glass, 1 strip 4" glass tape under the traveler, 1 layer continuous 3K carbon fiber, and a final 12" 14.5 oz glass strip under the traveler again. Seems pretty tough...I hope it stays together over the racing season. I've got a 12" hole in the seat on the port side I'll do next time I go down...will be easy to do in one layup I think.

New Gauge

Hey, the system is old and beat, but it works and the gauge looks good and pressure seems to read well. 3K PSI max for this boat!!

Backstay Pressure

The contraption in the photo is our old Stearns hydraulic backstay adjuster. The gauge never worked, so I'm replacing it with one from here. http://www.gaugestore.com/gaugestore/97wikpresgau26.html
Nice price, quick ship. I'll let you know how it works out.

Added a layer of 14.5 oz glass

The weather was cool today, around 40. Decided to add the 14.5 oz skin components. I used 12" cloth run transversally in 4 sections for this layer. I also ran a row of 4" tape down the center where I had overlap on the carbon. I wet out the glass on a piece of polyethelyne sheeting, then applied the wet mess by hand. It stuck well and all that was required was a little smoothing. I wore purple nitrile gloves this time....huge difference, no mess. :)

Skin started

Was blowing blue stink today (40 from the north). Working in the boat on stands made me more nervous than I think I would have been sailing in the same conditions! The core appears to have set well in place. Today I added an 8" 6K carbon fiber strap directly under the traveler. I ran it up the back of the seat and down the seat front. This should give me a little extra strength / less flex in this area where the traveler loads are high. Next will come the layer of 14.5oz glass over the carbon and the rest of the seat, and then a final layer of carbon 3K over the whole thing.

Core Set in Place

Was a nice day today...a little too nice, as the temperature approached 60 degrees. The Low Temperature Epoxy I have is good from 38 to 60...eek! After sanding the bulk of the old 'blue cheeze' filler off the deck, I test fit the compression fixture to make sure it would hold everything in place while the epoxy cured.

Next was to mix up the Low Temperature Epoxy and prime the surfaces. This was no big deal, but I did notice that the epoxy did not go as far as I thought it would. Oh well. After priming both surfaces, I added the hardener to the BOG mix I made up front by thickening the part A with colloidial silica...I did this so I would not waste time mixing. The mix was not as thick as I wanted, so I had to go back and add more filler. Again, the bog did not go as far as I thought it would. I pasted the boat surface with one batch, and hit the core with another batch. It was no where near the thickness I originally wanted...I ended up with about a millimeter thick layer on everything.

I hope it's enough! It was enough to hold the core in place without support. After sticking the core up, I pressed it in place with a hydraulic jack and a length of 2x4 pressing just the foam board. The thing I made earlier with the luan was too stiff and I needed too much pressure to get it to conform to the seat. The foam ended up working well. I squeezed it gently and just enough to get epoxy to ooze out around the edges a little. After that, I filled some hardware holes on the deck with epoxy to keep the water from getting in to the core. I plan to pull all the hardware eventually....but time limits me and I'm doing the high priority stuff 1st. Oh, BTW, a dixie cup of the Low Temp epoxy with no filler at 60 degrees will get so hot you can't hold the cup!! It is definitely not good unthickened at warm temps.

Some January Progress

Built the form today to press the balsacore into place once everything else is ready to go. I used 1/2" blue foam board cut as a template for the core material. That was pretty easy. The form is just a section of thin luan plywood cut to size. The idea is to press the core in place into a good epoxy bog and press it with light pressure from a hydraulic jack. It will take the slight curve of the seats from the pressure. The form is covered with polyethelyne plastic and will be reused to hold the skin on during the next step.