Ta Da! I finally finished it. Haven't been able to blog much about it, but here's how it looks... It has four coats of varnish on both the hull and deck. It probably should have had six or more, but I'm tired. I made my own padeyes, and I opted to not install a perimeter line yet. My friend who I built this for is a very casual user and this is probably sufficient for her, but perimeter lines would be a nice safety feature though. That's it! Until next time, I'm signing out for now.... Cheers!

The bulkheads are often one of the more challenging bits to install on your Pygmy. You install them after the deck is epoxied on and the hatches are cut. It's a pain to get them in there and fit them. First, you have to figure out where to put the forward bulkhead. You need to give at least an inch or more in front of the foot peg sliders. The aft bulkhead fits in just an inch or two behind the furthest aft part of the cockpit opening. Pygmy generally gives you a slightly oversized bulkhead, but I noticed on this latest Pinguino that the bulkheads fit better right out of the box than any other bulkheads. Nice! However, I still needed to trim the bulkheads a bit with my rasp and stationary sander. I apologize for not having any images of the trimming and fitting process. Ooops. Then you must remove the bulkheads and fiberglass them. Epoxy some cloth on both sides of each bulkhead. The focus of this post though is aligning the bulkheads so that they are as straight as pos...

Still slow going on the Pygmy Pinguino 145. Today I managed to get the inside hull/deck joints epoxy filled and taped. The manual has you do this earlier in the build, but also suggests that if you are planning on cutting hatches later that you can wait until then to do this step. It's a great suggestion by Pygmy and well worth waiting. IF you do wait to do this step, you can usually also avoid their "tape a filled syringe to a stick with a plunger" idea and just do it all by hand. On boats as short as the Pinguino you can reach the entire run of the joint by hand. Easy.  Here's how it looks now... Tomorrow I'll scrap, sand, and give a light coat of epoxy to the joints so that you don't cut yourself on the sharp tape edges. This will soften them up and make them much more comfortable on your skin. Cheers! 

It has been just too cold, too wet, and too busy to work on the Pygmy Pinguino kayak for a long time. But truth be told, I've also been busy on my latest wooden IOM RC sailboat ! But today I was able to get back to it by fiberglassing the first sides of the bulkheads and the hatch lips. How do you like my new logo that I had printed on rice paper? :-P See those holes near the top of each bulkhead? They are for pressure relief. After I fiberglass both sides I will drill a very small 1/16" or smaller hole through the cured epoxy to allow air to pass through. The hatches tend to work pretty well and can actually get sucked down quite firmly in warm weather so that you must pry the hatches up with a screwdriver and potentially damage the hull or hatch. The small holes let you avoid that. The bulkhead holes don't need to be as large as mine... I just happened to have that size Forstner bit in my drill press and was too lazy to chuck a smaller one. :-P  You only need ...

It's been a couple weeks since my last post. Haven't had too much time to work on the Pinguino. But this weekend I made up some ground. So far I've added a third coat of epoxy to the entire outside of the boat, and have sanded parts of the deck where the hatches and cockpit cowling will go. The hull I will let cure until the boat is done and I'm about to varnish. Yesterday I cut the hatches. Today I installed the spacer pieces for the hatches and the lower spacer pieces for the cowling. I then ran a bead of thickened epoxy around the outside of the cowling. It adds a nice touch and feels good on your fingers when you attach your spray skirt. Here's how it looks now... Yes, I have a lot of clamps. No, you can never have enough. :-P Over the years of making RC sailboats and other hobbies, I've amassed several boxes of clamps. Most are spring loaded which I prefer to screw-down C-clamps. I use C-clamps when I really need to get some pressure down, ...

Big step tonight... I fiberglassed the deck of the Pinguino 145. I think it turned out okay. Too many drips to clean up, but it shouldn't be too bad. A few slits in the cockpit helps the cloth to lay down in the recessed deck area. Will add a fill coat of epoxy tomorrow and then let it cure for a few days. Cheers!

It's been a busy week and I haven't had too much time for the kayak, but finally today I glued the deck on. Phew! First, earlier this week I installed the foot brace studs. I also sanded and then squeegeed on another light coat of epoxy where heels might rest. I'm just not happy with how it looks and may even do another coat after it full cures and I can sand it smooth. I then sanded the inside edges of the hull and deck and did a number of other clean-up jobs and such. But finally I got to glue the deck on. Here's how it looks: And I drilled the two holes for the painters too. Actually did that before gluing the deck on so that I could be sure I lined up the hole with the thickened-epoxy dams that I poured last week. I added a first coat of epoxy to the holes to seal the edges of the exposed wood around the holes. I'll sand that later and add another coat at some point. Tomorrow I'll sand the deck, seams and sides, and get ready for glassing t...

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...