I Need A Shrink !

[seafari25]

She's starting to look like a birdhouse. Where are you hanging the hummingbird feeders?

Looking Good Strick! Those hatches are awesome! Forward bilge pump eh? Not a bad idea...

Interesting note for you; the bilge pump in our 25 is about 25 years old. It's the second one. Since I've been looking after the boat, the pump gets about 10 mins use a year. Last year the boat was in the water for about 4 months and I didn't get enough water in the bilge to use it at all. Well, thats partly because I didn't wash out the cabin and stepdown... anyway it's a good idea to put a second(or third) pump in. You never know when you'll need it.

Dosage taken Doc...thanks

[Islandtrader]

Looking good. Lots of easy access storage room in those boxes. Insulation might be nice. I'm planning a custom fit fish box and am still undecided on the insulation process. Probably interior and exterior molds filled with expanding spray foam.

You can also buy urethane sheet foam up to 4 inches thick. Form that and glass and gelcoat.

[Blue_Heron]

Thats along the same lines that I was thinking.

strick

Be careful with the spray can foam for this application. Great Stuff is the brand I'm familiar with. It needs air to cure, and if you inject it into a confined space with no air to set the cure, it will continue to expand with considerable force and may deform your inner or outer shell. May work ok if you inject a little at a time, but I wonder if a two part foam might not work better?

[strick]

Thats a good point and I've been thinking about how I'm going to do that. Simply pouring 2 part expanding foam into the cavity between the two parts would bury the live well and fish box fill/drain fittings in the foam. Also if I poured foam on the bottom of the liner I would have to rasp down the foam as it would no doubt expand more then I would like it to. Probably the easiest way to do it would be to use spray foam and spray the inner liner prior to glassing it in place that way I could control how much foam I apply and then let it air cure prior to setting it in place. Any suggestions as to what kind of spray foam is best for this application would be appreciated because the only kind I can think of at the moment is the stuff that comes in a can you buy at the hardware store which is used for sealing holes in studs and gaps around windows during installation.

My crew came over on Sunday and helped me get the cap back on the hull and we also removed the boat from the trailer and placed it on jacks. I could not have done this alone so I got to thank Bill, Scott, and George for their help. we used the gantry crane to lift the top cap onto the hull but it was not tall enough so we still had to manually lift and carry it forward to set it in place. I was worried that we would gouge up my paint job when replacing the top cap but I'm happy to say that we did not get so much as a scratch on the inner liner paint job. Also the cap fits perfectly and all the bolt holes line up.










sanding the teak swim platform. This thing is going to look really nice when finished.




Working on the seat boxes. The one with the larger hatch will store dead fish and the one with the smaller hatch will have a live well inside.








With some luck I hope to get primer on the outer hull sides and bottom this weekend.

strick

[uncleboo]

I've used alot of Great Stuff in the past. If you have the patience, put it in a little at the time and let it expand. After a couple of times, you should get an idea of the expansion rate. Practice first.

[cdavisdb]

Not sure that this can be used as a generalization, but I just got a close look at a couple of boxes that had been insulated with spray foam, don't know what brand. Bad looking job, lots of gaps, lots of variation in the degree to which the foam expanded. It was obvious that getting the foam to cover evenly was beyond the appliers skill level.

Experimenting sounds like a very good idea and be prepared to go another route.

I've used the sheet foam method, worked very well for me, nice looking too. Spa Creek had a publication "The Perfect Box: 39 Ways to Improve Your Boats Ice Box" that detaile how to do it. I still have my copy if needed.

[76Red18]

I was thinking of the 2 part spray insulation used on the plywood between trusses. A friend of mine is in the business. Problem is the confined space and excess pressure.

[SBD]

I have built lots of things using blue household foam insulation. It is very inexpensive, easy to form using a Surform, and crazy strong with just a few laminations over it. It has been used for many structural applications including all Rutan aircraft. It is only compatible with epoxy however, ester will turn it into napalm.

I would consider bonding it to the inside and skinning it.

[strick]

A little progress this weekend. I was able to get some work done to the seat box molds. The MDF was sanded with 220 and modeling clay was used to make the radius's around the corners. The molds were then waxed with partall paste and 5 coats of PVA was then sprayed onto the mold surface. This was allowed to cure 24 hours and then duratex was applied to the inside of the mold.









I made some patterns of the top and sides of the molds out of heavy construction paper and then pre cut all my glass and core cell to fit.








2 layers of heavy matt were laminated in place



The a layer of 1708 and then the core cell was glued in place



I try to use up as much scrap fiberglass as I can. Using the extra material helps cut costs on glass.



The gaps between the corecell were filled with cabosil and then 2 layers of 1708 are laminated in place. All the corners get a layer of 1708 tape several times during the lamination.












I've been working to get the bottom of the boat ready for primer. There were 3 thru hulls that needed to get filled and now that we have access to the bottom of the boat we were able to finally get that done.




Moving back to the seat boxes. Excessive glass was trimmed with the grinder and my little harbor freight tool that I showed earlier.




The roto zip works well to cut the glass on the out side of the mold.




Some shots showing the part coming out of the mold. It's nice when things turn out good as this seat box did. No alligators or voids in the glass...and the part did not stick to the mold.... all problems I've had at one time or another. I think I'm starting to get better at this.










The clay is removed to be used another day.




The box is strong and light weight. There will be a liner that goes into this when I get a chance to make it.






















Thats it for now

strick

[uncleboo]

Nice work!!! I wonder how many of us with suffer withdrawal symptoms when you finish. Keep it coming!