Back-n-forth, backnforth...backnforthbacknforth...

I've been going round and round on what to make the beam of and how to construct it, and composites have won out in the end.

Right now I have 2 pieces of 1" thick foam cut to fit the outer edges of the beam area, sitting in place and defining the space needed, while I look and ponder. They are 2.5" in the vertical dimension, and the for'd edge to the after is 8". I'm going to do the "box" construction I drew up several posts back, with approx 1/4" of glass between each foam layer.

At 2.5", it doesn't noticeably 'intrude' into the open feeling of the cabin as I have it, so I will probably stick to that dimension. I'll probably taper them down somewhat on the verticals where the beam meets the cabin trunk, perhaps to 1" of protrusion.

Ebb - I gave much thought to doing the external beam concept, but figure that I will leave that mod for someone else to try.

Mike - A friend made a great suggestion to me the other day. He's the guy who works in composites. Once again I was bouncing the idea of the foam-cored, glass-skinned homemade 'plywich' off of him. Big dilemma there is the amount of $$$ I would have to spend on 1) epoxy resin if I used pink/blue polystyrene foam, or 2) the difficulty and expense of finding suitable thickness polyurethane foam if using polyester resins. Plus, there would be a lot of work simply in laying up the panels themselves, and then sanding, getting them flat and true enough that they'll look decent.

He suggested instead to bond pink/blue foam to a 1/4" plywood using a simple but appropriate adhesive, and cut panels from that. It can then be affixed into the boat with, at least on the big surfaces, a simple layer or two of 6 oz glass and polyester resin. Brilliant! Sure, epoxy would be better, and I will use that in structural areas (like the beam), but this way I can have a cheap, easily shapeable yet tough foam-cored structure for the cabinetry below.

I'll be making a trip up to the bigbox hardware store soon in order to confirm pricing, but it should result in less time, money, and hassle to use his idea. The only 'drawback' I can see is that the panels will be maybe 3/8" thicker than I had thought they would, which is no issue at all, really, since it is more thickness of a material significantly lighter than water.

I'm glad to have found a way to use polyester resins for this. Not just because of expense, but also due to the facts that I'll have less risk of becoming sensitized to those compounds, and mostly due to the fact that I have slung so much polyester over the years that I am most comfortable using it.

And afterall, this boat is made of it, and is still doing just fine after 40 years...