Gluing on the sides

With a certain amount of trepidation, I went ahead and glued on the sides today. I re-read the plans last night, and the more I did, the more I have the feeling I scarfed the sides the wrong way. At the same time, the more I study on this, the more I conclude that it doesn't matter. Absolute worst case is that the sides of my boat are about an inch lower than they otherwise should be. I can live with that.

They went on pretty easy, although this is definitely a two-person job. I was fortunate enough to have my daughters around to help me position the sides, and Anthony (the kid from across the street who has taken such an interest in this project) was there to hand me screws as I drove the sides home.

While dry-fitting the sides, I marked them where the mating surfaces make contact with the chines and transoms. I also made some marks on the edges to allow me to return it to the exact same position when I install it during gluing. I also marked the location of the screws holding the chine laminations together so I didn't try to drill through one of those.

Then I pulled them off, trimmed off the excess (mainly on the ends), and then pre-drilled screw holes every eight to ten inches along the entire side. I used a bit that was slightly bigger than the screws I am using, so there is no chance the sides aren't pulled tight.

Next, I wrapped some wax-paper around the jig in those spots where the squeeze out might end up binding the sides to the jig. Last thing I want is to have trouble getting the hull off the jig when its time.

I used way more epoxy than I needed to on this, but I wanted to make sure I had good joints, so I was willing to waste some. I started out by mixing a "double batch" (four squirts of resin, two squirts of hardener) using the "fast" hardener and brushed that on all the mating surfaces....the chines and the transoms, as well as the side. Its pretty cool out in the garage today, so that stuff was fairly thick. It took the whole batch to coat one side.

Then I mixed a "triple batch" (six squirts of resin, three squirts of hardener) using the "slow" hardener, and added thickener (wood flour) until it was almost peanut butter thick. I brushed this on all the mating surfaces as well. It went on thick, and again, I ended up with pretty much the exact amount I needed (doing one side at a time, of course). 

Then it was time to round up one of my daughters, and carefully position the side on the boat. I had made a location mark near the center, and I started with that. Then it was a matter of getting the edge fair to the chine stem to stern, and temporarily clamping it in place.

With the side in position, I started at the middle, drilled and countersunk a hole in each hole I had pre-drilled, and installed a 1" stainless steel screw. There was a TON of squeeze-out, which I wanted. I'd rather waste glue than have a dry joint. After getting all the screws installed, I went back with a mixing stick and scraped off as much of the squeeze-out as I could. This is what I got off of the port side:

Here's some shots of the boat as she sits right now:

As cool as it is, there is a chance that it won't be cured by tomorrow. If that's the case, I'll take the day off. This was done using mostly "slow" hardener, and that stuff has proven to be maddenly slow. As I've gotten more comfortable using the epoxy, I pretty much only use the fast. I used the slow here because I wasn't sure how much working time I was going to need. As it turned out, I could have used fast just fine. Problem is, I've got a bunch of the slow that I need to use eventually, so I may as well put it to work.

As for the potential for having done this all wrong, we will have to see. I will say that the Barlow book would be better with less text (that isn't particularly clear) and MORE PICTURES! That's part of why I am keeping this blog...to help fill in those gaps for the next guy building one of these.