Saturday, November 13, 2010

Floored

The floor is on. I had originally planned to knock it out in one massive layup but I quickly realized that it would be impossible for 1 person and such a complicated part so I ended up breaking it up into 3 pieces. I did the port and starboard side floors up to the ski pole and then the bow floor and battery box in one large layup after laying the bow section. I did the bow section wet with a layer of peel ply but no vacuum bag.

For the last 5 bagged layups (port stringer, starboard stringer, port floor, starboard floor and bow floor) I've been using "peel ply" and "bleeder cloth" which is how it should always be but before I didn't have any. I found some nylon cloth at Walmart, a 10 yard bolt for 5 bucks and a cheap polyester blanket that have been working great. The nylon peels right off the cured epoxy and the blanket soaks up the excess. The vacuum machine has been working great but my bagging skill is a little lacking. I haven't once had a seal good enough that the pump didn't cut on about every minute or so and the last two, the pump just ran all night long.

Tomorrow is my last day working on the ski boat. There are 2 coats of epoxy in the bilge area with white pigment giving it a nice industrial gloss white finish and and my friend has decided to hold off on carpeting the floor until after the engine installation which could be a bit of a dirty job. All that is left now is to drill and fill some mounting holes for the engine mounts, and steering cable attachment and reinstall and rebedd the hull hardware. More pics soon.