Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Step into my office

The Hull is tortured 4mm plywood. Unlike conventional tortured ply cat hulls, I used 3 panels to form the initial shape seen in the previous post. This allowed for a more semicircular cross section with plenty of rocker. With a traditional 2 panel and keel joint, a more V'd bottom is required for the same rocker.

Hull shape finalized. Bulkheads and stringers going in next.

2x4 technology here. A compression strut used to force the
bottom down and narrow the hull.

The first bulkhead. Note also that the inwales and keel stiffener are installed now. The outer 1x2 gunwales are just a form for the hull and will be removed later. I got a bit greedy on the transom shape and wasn't able to pull that much curvature out of the panels so I cut into the joins about 18 inches forward from the aft end and wired them together so I could "reset" the joint angle and narrow the transom further. This angle could have been set when I joined the panels in the first place but this is an experimental 1-off so we go with the flow.

On the cutting edge. Note, again the temporary 1x2 gunwales. She has about a 10 degree half angle of entry so I expect very little wave making resistance from this hull shape.

Friday, August 19, 2011

Trimaran

The design and construction of the trimaran for UFC 2012 next march has taken over my life. The goal is to be sailing her by the end of November. I won't be doing any in depth posts about the build but I will post pictures whenever I feel like it.

Folding up the main hull. First Panels are joined, not much of a boat yet. How did I know what shape to make the panels so that it folds up into a sleek and sexy hull you ask? Well wouldn't you like to know.

Main hull almost to final shape. Compression posts will be used to force the bottom to the final depth which will flatten the sides and narrow the shape further. More pics to come.