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Spent the day working on Destiny today...
And the pictures below show why you don't use polyester resins to tab in a bulkhead. The first picture is what somebody did for the previous owner when he replaced the bulkheads. It was coming loose and when I pryed on it a little it just popped loose which you can see in the second picture. I had to cut it loose from the bulk head so I can redo the tabbing.
My current project is repairing and reinforcing the bottom side of the deck where I will later be recoreing from the top. After patching all of the holes I will be putting a layer of 1708 biax and a layer of 6oz finishing cloth on the bottom of the deck to give it more strength before I cut into the top. And once I had talked myself into going to all that work I decided I would fill the toe rail so I could tie the hull and deck together and make a better looking job of the reinforcing. The third picture is a drawing of what I'm doing at the toe rail.
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Ebb you know I appreciate your ideas...
One of the best parts of having this forum is that it offers us the chance to bounce ideas off each other. Many times other people will bring up points you have not considered. That seems to be the situation here.
When I use 1708 biax my procedure has been to wet out the area I want to apply the mat to then wet out the mat on both sides working the epoxy into the mat on a flat surface. Then I pick up the saturated mat and apply it to the surface I'm woking on rolling out any bubbles.
Now here comes the part (being honest) that I had not considered. I have not had any problem with the mat sticking to a verticle surface when I applied it. So I had not considered that it would not stick to the bottom side of the deck. And your point seems to be a valid concern.
Being a bit hard headed once I have committed towards a course of action and since you say you have never actually tried it yourself, I think I'm going to try a section in the bow in the chain locker area. If I have to grind it back out in there and do something else it does not matter as much if it is not as attractive of a finish.
The side of the hull and to a much lesser extent the bottom of the deck both have a lot of bumps and hollows in the glass work. I had already assumed I would fair those areas out with thicked epoxy before I apply the mat. I wanted a nice smooth surface to make it easier for the mat to stick to it without bubbles and hollow spots.
BTW Ebb, you will be happy to hear that I am no longer using West System epoxy. I found Raka non-blushing epoxy which seems like it wets out better also. Certainly a lot cheaper and it has a good reputation on the plastic classic forum. The other thing that has been mentioned about this epoxy is that is seems to cause less reactions for people like me who are sensitive to it.
As far as the toe rail goes... my thought pattern went something like this. It is my hope that someday one of my grandchildren will take up sailing and then ownership and care of Destiny. As a matter of fact that is one of the things that drew me to the commander. I wanted a large enough cockpit so I could take my family sailing and we would all be able to sit in the cockpit comfortably. So I wanted something that would never be a problem down the road. And since the rubrail is screwed into this area it was conceivable to me that over time water could get in there and cause the wood to rot if I put wood up in there. Granted it would take a very long time and likely not occur in my lifetime but possibly in my granchildren's. So I wanted somthing water would not affect. I talked to the folks at Fiberglass Coatings in St. Pete and we came up with a polyester putty that they developed called FC8 that is thickened with microfibers and silica that would fill the toe rail area. I'm not asking it to do anything structural I'm only asking it to fill a void that will be enclosed with epoxy wet out fiberglass. For $90.00 I got a 5 gal bucket of the stuff that should be enough to do the toe rail. Then not being one to just take some salesman's word for anything I mixed up a pint of the putty and put it on a piece of plastic that would allow me to get it off in one piece. I wanted to see how strong the stuff was. The putty was about 1/2" thick and when I tried to break it I could not do it until I supported the two ends and took a hammer to it. Then when it did break it broke cleanly into 3 pieces and did not just shatter. Take a look at the pictures below.
Here is a link to the website.
http://www.fgci.com/
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Started putting putty into the toe rail today...
Temperature got up to 61 degrees today which was just enough to start putting some of the putty into the toe rail. I'm posting now because I'm waiting for the 3rd layer to cure enough that I can put in another layer yet today.
This putty has the consistancy of drywall mud. I used to buy old houses and fix them up so I got pretty good with drywall finishing. It helped with this job.
The first picture below shows how I marked a referance line on the hull for how far down I wanted to go with the putty. This line is about 1/8" below the deck which insures I'm below the butt joint of the hull and deck.
The second picture below are the tools I've been using today. A round nose trowel, a 3" drywall knife, a 6" drywall knife, a pint mixing cup, a CC cup to measure the MEKP hardener and a plastice mixing board and last but not least a couple of box fans with one blowing fresh air into the cabin and a second one sucking air out from the forward hatch.
The key to working with this stuff is not trying to put too much in at once. As I type this I have 3 layers of putty in the toe rail and I expect it will take 5 or 6 to get it completely filled. And then I may need to do a skim coat to level out a few areas after that.
For the most part I used the 6" drywall knife to put the putty into the toe rail. I used the 3" drywall knife to scrape the 6" knife clean so I did not have putty on the knife anywhere but where I wanted it. The trowel was only useful for stuffing some putty into some inside corners where I could not get with the 6" knife. I also used the 3" knife for mixing the material on the mixing board. I would put the putty on the board and dig a little hole in the center. Then I poured the MEKP into the hole in the center and mixed it until it was a consistant color through out.
The last picture below shows how much putty I would put on the knife before I pushed it up into the toe rail. For most of the filling operation I used the drywall knife perpendicular to the toe rail and would just push what was on the end of the knife into the toe rail and then move over 6" more and do the same thing again. Once I get it full enough I will use the 3" knife and run parallel to the length of the toe rail to get a nice even layer. Then finally I will do a skim coat just filling in low spots.
The next post will show a progression of photo's showing layers of putty going in.
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Well the weather has redirected me a bit...
away for a short time from the toe rail project and towards finishing up the all mahogany tiller. Yesterday we had another 70 plus degree day so I cut out of work a little early so I could take advantage of the warm air to glue up my all mahogany tiller. Then today the temperature after work was below 60 degrees so I did not want to chance the putty not setting up so instead I finished making the tiller.
All went well until I was using a router bit to put a radius in the edges of the tiller and I had a blow out. See the first picture below.
But if you were to hold the tiller in your hands and look at it you would never know it was there unless I showed you what to look for. The second tiller shows the salvaged tiller and the original one I made.
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Ebb that sounds like it would make a nice looking tiller
Not sure it would work with my design unless I eliminated the knob on the bottom side of the tiller. I need all of the laminations to get the height for the knob. And that is also why almost my entire taper is on the bottom. This leaves the top piece almost intact and continuous.
As I was typing that it occurred to me I could just glue a couple of pieces to the end of the bottom afterwards to make my knob.
I do have one bottom strip that dies out completely and a second one that comes close which leaves the very obvious glue line from the resorcinol on the bottom which you can see in the picture below.
I also agree with the thinner strips thought. I honestly think I could have made mine thinner than I did which was 1/4". But when I did my test clamp up everything seemed to work OK so I went with it. But thinner strips would have created less stress just more glue lines.