Wacko Ways to Build a Boat

I've spent the past day and today doing a number of jobs that just need to be done but aren't that noticeable. First, I added a saturation coat to the bare wood on the #4 panels above where I cut the fiberglass the other day. I also added a layer of epoxy over the area where heels may rest. Today I scraped the sides and heel area and added another coat of epoxy.Here's how it looks now. It's technically a third coat, but really only two as much of the first two have been either scraped or sanded. I may add a third layer once this is cured. I also worked on the end pours. The Pygmy manual says to do the end pours later on after the boat is complete. It says to take the boat outside and prop it up on a wall with the end in a bucket of ice water. Then you contort yourself and pour thickened epoxy down into the end and let it cure. Then you do the other end. THEN... you have to guess where you can drill holes through the ends for your painters (the lines that you t...

Big step today... I fiberglassed the inside of the hull. This is always the trickiest part of the entire kayak build, but I'm afraid I didn't do my best work. It's... okay... but not great. I started by running tape around the #4 panel 3/4" up from the seam. The bottom of this tape is where I'll cut the cloth once it reaches the green stage. Then I smoothed out an extra piece of fiberglass cloth that I purchased from Pygmy. The manual says that enough cloth is included with the kit, but they require you to cut two overlapping triangles from one piece. I've done it and it doesn't usually look good. It also leaves way too many pulled out threads. I prefer to just buy an extra piece the length of the boat. Then I started on the epoxy. I'm a "two squeegee" guy and I don't use the rollers. It's all done with a squeegee and a chip brush. The few runs and sags that I have would not have necessarily been avoided if I used a roller, ...

Well, it's at least almost prepped for fiberglassing... still have to run some tape along the #4 panels. But today I reinforced the butt seam and added some thickened epoxy to the ends, all exactly according to the Pygmy manual. The only thing I didn't do according to the manual is that I don't add a saturation coat to the inside. Wetting it out will fully saturate the cloth and it's an added step. To saturate or not to saturate is the eternal fiberglassing question asked by wooden boat people. There are two strong camps, each with their own reasons. I've just never found a convincing reason to do it as simply wetting it all out in one step has always worked well.  Fiberglassing the inside of the hull is always the trickiest job of the entire project, so fingers crossed that it goes well! Cheers!

Today I lightly scraped the underside of the Pinguino deck and added a second coat of epoxy. Like yesterday, I poured epoxy onto a section, squeegeed it out to evenly spread it around, used a disposable chip brush in places, and then squeegeed off the excess. Finally I used the brush again to even out the squeegee lines. It looks pretty good right now and tomorrow I'll put it aside and turn my attention back to the hull. If you compare to yesterday's pics, you can see that the flat, fuzzy areas are all gone and the entire underside has a nice sheen to it. Cheers!

Some pretty straightforward steps this morning. First, I used my carbide scraper to clean up the raised and rough edges of the fiberglass tape that I put down on the underside of the Pinguino deck yesterday. Take your time and really clean it up. You'll feel the underside of the deck but won't ever see it, so make sure that it FEELS nice and smooth. Don't worry so much about how it looks. Then I used my random orbital sander to get some of the high spots flat and to lightly sand the wood panels. Why are you doing this?:  Your biggest goal is to cut, scrape, or sand out rough spots and especially bits that can cut  you. Fiberglass cloth can be VERY sharp and "sandpaper-like" on your knees and skin, so you want to make sure that anything that can cut or scrape you is removed and covered with a couple coats of fresh epoxy. You also want to completely seal the wood as you will not be fiberglassing the underside of the deck. This is the only waterproofing it wil...

Once you remove the deck from the hull, you have two steps to do on the underside of the deck. You can do both steps the same day and let it all cure. 1. Tape all the seams: You first need to add some thickened epoxy to the reinforcement plates at the front of the cockpit. The idea is that you make a smooth transition between the plates at all three butt joints. Then you add two layers of fiberglass tape just over the joints of the reinforcement panels and wet them out. Cute 6 pieces of tape 3.5" each, add them over the small joints, and wet them out. Now you'll tape ALL the seams. Cut long strips of fiberglass tape to run the entire length of the deck on all three main seams. See the picture below. Wet out the fiberglass tape and work it down into the seams so that it sits right on top with as few bubbles as you can get. It's pretty hard to use a squeegee, but you can dapple it with a disposable chip brush or disposable acid brush. Just make sure all the tape...

Today I untaped the deck and it came right off. Looks great. I added some epoxy to some of the seams, especially around the recessed panel, just to fill in some gaps. Oh, and oooops... I forgot to do the reinforcing on the top panels earlier, so I added them now. Shouldn't be an issue at all. I should say this though, Pygmy forgot to add the reinforcing plywood strips to my kit. They quickly shipped them to me as soon as I emailed, which is great, but the four pieces they included were each long enough to do the side-supports for the seats but not long enough to do the under-deck reinforcement panels. So I cut two of them as best I could but as you can see they do not extend all the way to the sheer line. I'm very sure (95% sure...?) that this will still be okay, especially given the extremely light use that this boat will get, but I may still add some additional bracing from my own scrap wood regardless. This weekend I'll start working on taping the inside...

Next big step has been accomplished... the Pygmy Pinguino 145 deck has been taped into place and epoxied together. NOTE : The deck has NOT been epoxied to the hull yet... that step will come later on. In this step, the panels #5 and #6 have been epoxied together but panels #4 & #5 have NOT been epoxied together . The entire deck can still be removed from the hull. You will be doing a number of additional steps on the underside of the deck and on the inside of the hull, so the deck must be able to be removed! ______________________________ Start by adding some tape over the edges of the hull at the ends. Put tape over the edges for about the first 8" or so at each end. NOTE : In the picture below you can see that the two stern ends of the #5 panels are neatly lined up. What you can't see is the huge amount of pressure that the strapping tape is exerting on the two panels to twist them into place. You will need to use the tape's holding power to keep the panels ...

We've had out of town guests for the past two weekends, so nothing has been done on the boat for awhile. Since the last post, I've sanded the entire hull with 220 paper on my random orbital sander. It looks okay, but later on I will add another layer, or maybe even two, of epoxy and then sand that down. Right now there are still a few too many high and low spots that could be filled. I could do it now, but I'm anxious to get going on the deck so I'll do it at the end before final sanding. It'll make sanding the sides easier too. So today I unscrewed the spacers from the table and turned the boat over. The spacers were then unscrewed and were easily pried off from the temporary frames with a quick hammer hit on a putty knife (remember that they were hot-glued on too). I also added some tape to the top of the temporary frames in preparation for the deck gluing coming up shortly. Then I worked on the butt seam for the top two deck panels. They have a small pie...

Today I rolled on a filler coat of epoxy over the fiberglass cloth that I did yesterday. It didn't entirely fill the weave but should be enough for me to sand pretty well. After sanding, I may add a third coat if needed but we'll see. What I actually did was try to roll on the epoxy like the manual says, but I've never had luck with the rollers. They quickly fill with air, they don't distribute the epoxy well like a paint roller distributes paint, and they tend to fall apart and leave little foam bits on my hull. But I tried it again today... it fell apart and left too much air in the epoxy... doh! So when I had had enough I went back to what I've typically done, which is to simply use the same yellow plastic spreader/squeegee thing that I used to wet out the fiberglass cloth yesterday. Easy. I wasn't sure if I'd like the red color of the stem fill but now I do. It's taken on a rich, darker color and it will work well. I like it so much in fact,...