Scarf Musings

First up, I want to apologise for the lack of posts here. I know how annoying it can be when you have an occasional look at a blog and there's been no action for a while. Poor old thing is sitting out there under the tarps again. The build has been on the back burner since February, due to overwhelming work/family/study commitments, but I hope to resume work on her shortly.

In my defense, I did spend quite a bit of time having a go at scarfing the teak for the gunwales, but my experiments haven't gone well. My excitement in finally being up to working with wood again has been thwarted by inexperience. Cutting scarf angles to an 8:1 ratio and just epoxying them together sounds so simple, yet it turns out that it is also so incredibly easy to get wrong. I've only got just enough Teak for the gunwales, so after reading up on the process in various books, I started experimenting on scrap bits of timber.

I tried cutting the bevels with a saw, chisels, planes, etc., but I kept stuffing it up. I spent ages messing around with my table/drop saw, but the fences can only be adjusted to 45 degrees (my bevels require way more). I tried just sanding them on my disc/belt sanding station but I couldn't get it very accurate (mind you, I was using old hardwood fence palings). Finally I decided to set up a jig (like a miter box) using more scrap timber. This had the parallel advantage of also being able to experiment with using my epoxy mixed as a glue. It looked like it could have worked, except that some idiot made the jig too short.... (I'm not naming names). The jig did prove useful during my tantrum-like destruction testing. The epoxy glue joints appear to be bullet-proof. The wood fibers came away instead of the glue letting go, so I'm quite happy that it should hold up OK in the boat (e.g. the stringers supporting the seats).



At that point, I retreated and adopted the tactic of avoidance. This hasn't seemed to have helped though, so my current plan is to seek the help of someone with a bit of competence. I reckon I might even just pay someone to cut the scarfs for me. It's imperative that these bits are done right, since they're going to be structural items and they really MUST be left varnished.

Anyway, if you come back for another look in a few weeks, hopefully you will see a bit more progress.

Final Fill-Coat and Gunwale Timber

With the end of all this fiber-glassing nonsense within sight (at least for a little while), I was pretty excited when I started on the fill-coat of epoxy last Friday. I got up early, setting up my bigger tarp as a tent before breakfast (was to be another hot day). Then, after a quick breakfast, I happily got into it.



Firstly, I went around the sheer and trimmed all of the excess glass cloth. I found that a Stanley knife (and a bit of care) worked the best. I also cut out any big blisters and made small holes in some smaller ones. Then I gave everything another sand, vacuum and wipe down.









Then I started mixing and applying the epoxy fill-coat from the bow. Flushed with my earlier successes with the glass cloth, I felt confident in my capacity to bend the peel-ply to my will. Oh, the naivete. Let's just say that the peel-ply had other ideas (see photo below).



After messing around with it for ages, I finally discarded that foul stuff and just focused on filling the weave as best I could. I cut out small patches and fitted them into the holes of the bigger blisters, whilst the smaller ones got heavier doses of epoxy (in the hope of flooding them with resin). It all seems to have turned out OK, if a bit rough. The texture of the weave is still obvious, but I reckon I'm going to use a bit of the fairing powder on the inside to smooth it out properly when the time comes. In any case, I think that this hull is now as good as I can get it, and it's pretty much ready for the interior fitting out.

Since today is my one day off, I wanted to make the most of it. I had called my mate (Rick) yesterday, to see if his earlier offer of some gunwale timber was still available. He was as good as his word (as always), and said to lob out to his factory early today if I wanted to catch him. I arrived right on time and he pointed me at some magnificent, straight grained, quarter sawn Teak, which was almost exactly the dimensions I needed. He loaded me up with all that I needed, and waved away my offers of payment (shit I'm going to owe this bloke, big time).

Once I got this lot home, I had a bit of a think about it and worked out whether or not I have enough (turns out just about perfect).



Then I set up my trusty convertible table/drop saw in the shade (it's ridiculously hot today), setting the fence to the right width. Then I carefully ripped each length individually, leaving me with a stack of almost correctly sized Teak strips for my inner and outer gunwales (plans specify 10mm x 40mm, whilst this stuff is 9mm x 37mm).






Beautiful. This is going to look shit-hot when it's been varnished.



These bits still have to be scarfed into the correct lengths, then I can fit the inner and outer gunwales; quickly followed by the bulkheads, ring-frame, stringers, seats and then decks. I hope I can get through these jobs quickly now because my next study period is looming again (end of February), and I know that I'm going to get slowed right down yet again then.