There has been some confusion. Since Lori posted the link to this blog on her Facebook account, some folks seem to think she's building a boat. While she is more than capable, she prefers working with fabric and building custom quilts. I don't work with fabric, cause it's not a manly pursuit. We're building boats here!
Now that we've got that straight, let's get back to boat building. Today, we're fiberglassing the seams. We start by cutting our fabric. Wait a minute. That can't be right. I mean, this is different. We use a rotary cutter and a rotary mat and... Wait, wait, sounds just like Lori's quilting project. But, this is MAN fabric! No flowers or paisley print, just good ole fashion fiberglass fabric. It's manly, really.
Okay, so yesterday, my arrow slinging, squirrel killing, doctor friend came over and we used an interesting technique to pull the side and bilge panels together to minimize the gaps. We drilled holes in the upper and lower panels and pulled them together with copper wire. We literally stripped the wire from household electrical wiring.
From this point, I got underneath the boat and put resin and cotton flox into the seam. This basically glued the seams together. Then, I pulled the copper out and removed the tape. Then,sanded the seams on the outside. Next, I used the same resin and cotton flox mixture on the outside. Then, I laid fiberglass fabric strips right into the flox mix. I put another fabric called peel ply on top of the fiberglass. And yes, It's a MAN fabric too! It helps smooth the seam and once everything is dry, you peel it right off and it looks much better.
I had to cut the ends of the bilge panels before laying the fiberglass on the transom.
Tomorrow, we flip the boat and start on the inside. Looks like I started this "winter project" just in time. Here's shot out the back door looking toward the shop. A little chilly out there!
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