I fxxked up!

The pic on the right is the boat laminated on the inside with carbon - the pic on the left is all the carbon that peeled straight out of the inside of the boat after the first time I laminated.

I used the exact same process of fair, fill, fair, fill, fair, clean, resin, lay cloth, work resin, peelply (as shown in the previous post) but despite the cloth wetting out beautifully nearly half of the cloth laid didn't bond to the hull!!!!

The only difference in the outside of the hull to the inside was that I used a Nylon abrasive brush (type that goes into a drill) to fair some of the trickier spots - and it seems that nylon dust caused the resin not to bond in areas. So after several heartbreaking days of pulling out carbon, sanding, fairing, filling (and cleaning with acetone) I am now happy with the inside and am ready to put on the foredeck and bulkhead. As it is now New Years Eve that may have to wait until tomorrow.

More Progress

A quick photo before I get busy with the spatulas and squeegees, man I'm glad I chose (Geoff strongly suggested) slow resin hardener as getting this carbon to go around corners has been challenging.

On the trolley - our tame aluminium welder bailed on us so I put together a very simple bolted trolley which I plan to get welded later. 

Back to the shed.....

Now the work can really begin

The boat is off the mould (and about to go on the cradle so I can start work). It was a three person job with 2 of us lifting, and 1 looking under the hull to free any tight frames or spots where chines were tight (chines come out with the frame).

And it is a girl, as it is definitely pink on the inside.

Having a couple of issues separating the hull from the mould - nothing too major but I just need to wait until a couple of people can come over and help (as I don't want to force anything)

A boat or an expensive blob of carbon resin and foam

Well the resin is curing with plenty of peelply, in a couple of days we'll know whether it has the structural integrity to be called a boat. I think its kay, but the laying up and resining always felt rushed. Time to shut the shed door and walk away for a couple of days.

Boat is faired, filled and faired and filled and faired - I am certain that I could do this four or five more times but i think I am ready to Carbon the hull now (hindsight will be 20/20 on if I am right). So the weather is looking good, the rain has cleared up so the next post should be of a laminated hull waiting to dry while we build some aluminium boat trolleys. I am nervous and excited, I don't think I have rushed anything so i hope it all goes well.  In the picture you can see the boat with the carbon and peel ply hanging up at the back of the shed:

• I'm using a light glue spray on the carbon to hold the fibres together when I cut
• I bough a really good pair of scissors (like $40 dollars) and they are worth every cent

SO I need to cut and lay up the rest of the carbon, vacuum (the cleaning kind) the hull again, cut the peel ply and then mix resin - and pray I don't/haven't screwed it up! 

Test sample of carbon

My test sample of carbon and foam. While we wait for the rain to ease up (humidity is to high in the shed) I did a couple of test samples of carbon to practice to make sure I don't go too heavy on the resin.

In this sample I had 35gms of foam, 19 gms of carbon and a total cured weight of 79 gms - just need to use the spatula a bit ore after I put the peelply on.

1% of the area 99% of the effort

Well we delayed laminating today until next Tuesday as I was not happy with the bow shape. Geoff has forwarded me templates for frames 1 and 2 that have the foam factored in so I should be able to sight from these as to whether I need to keep sanding or fill and fair. It's frustrating but it is worth getting right.

I also did a test lay up of carbon on foam last night, so we can approximate if there may be a weight issue and look at vacuum bagging ....

More rain, and Bubs on antibiotics have cut seriously into boat building (but family comes first), but if I get my arse into gear and finish fairing by Wednesday we'll still be able to laminate the carbon Thursday morning (touch wood). If not it will be next week, as it's my brothers wedding this weekend.

Sorry it's been a bit quiet, but there isn't much to say (or take pictures of) when you are just sanding and fairing.

The plan is to laminate next Thursday so pictures and posts will be coming thick and fast then.