Glued Stems and Alignment Checks

Slow start to the day this morning (I do love my Sunday morning cook up brekkies), but once I got started, I managed a pretty productive day.

First up, it was finally time to glue the stem laminates. A quick inspection of the test panel revealed that the glossy 3M packaging tape was the most "non-stickiest". So I quickly taped up the stem molds as best I could and launched into the gluing process with gusto.
Geez, what a slippery, slimy mess I created. With much jiggling, fiddling & farting around, I managed to get them all glued & clamped.




Could definitely have done with an extra three pair of hands, but with a bit of patience it was finished relatively fast. Got a suspicion that I may have glued my clamps to the job though.



There you go. Bit of a bloody mess, but at least it's done. I'm open to suggestions as to how I can incorporate the clamps into some sort of design feature.



After that, I had another look at the test panel. It looked like a bit of a Frankenstein job, with the edges of the fiberglass tape going across & all of the lumps & bumps. Undeterred, I gave it a bit of a sand, followed by another thickish coat of resin. Then trotted back out to the set up out front to give the mold alignments a good going over.

My fairing batten (with the scarf joint glued using the not-good-enough-rubbery-glue), turned out good enough for fairing purposes after all, so I started holding it against the molds & tried to check fairness. It was far too long to do this by hand, so I racked my brain for a solution. I tried my longer bar clamps, but they were no good (too fiddly). Looking around, I saw the elastic tarp tie downs (from my earlier, famously disastrous tarp fiasco). I slipped them around the batten & placed each one at a mold station. Then it was a simple matter of looping the tie down around one of the mold-to-extension bolts at each station. Perfect. (Strewth I good).




Using this method, I was able to place the batten at any point I wished on the whole assembly and sight along it from various vantage points. It quickly confirmed my suspicions about the alignment at a few of the molds & I spent some time readjusting a few as best I could. It's still not perfect, but I think good enough. From this point I should be able to either pack out or shave the molds in any areas that still force the planking into unfair curves.

Whilst packing up & putting everything away, I had another quick look at the test panel. I was surprised at how good it's starting to look. It's getting that smooth, deep look & the grain looks fantastic. Here's a couple of photos.






I don't know if I should do another layer of resin before sticking on some varnish, or just launch into varnishing straight away. I've got a bit of left over marine vanish that I could use. See how I feel on the day I guess.
My plan is to now order the stuff that I intend to use on the actual boat & try it on the other side of this panel, to see how/if the two systems differ.

Also, I'm hoping to mill the edges of the planking stock on Wednesday morning. If I can achieve this, then I reckon I should be able to start planking on the same day. Apparently, the planking part progresses quite quickly. Wonder what the chances would be of finishing the planking by the weekend? Am I being over ambitious????