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Woe on to thee who has seen the bottom and does not yet see the promised land. It has come to pass that there are some areas on the bottom that are not as high as others. So my salvation is probably some thick, thick 410/pox mix to build these areas up, high enough to fair and fill in some seriously depressed square inches? Anyone have any brighter ideas?

It is probably a half inch of so off the curve. In the worse spot(s)...gulp

..sounds like the plan
,,,,unless yer want to go back-in-time and build a full male jig before laying-up the panels

..sounds like the plan
,,,,unless yer want to go back-in-time and build a full male jig before laying-up the panels

..from everything I've seen,this 'time-consuming extra-step' would save MUCH time and frustration with the build overall

Use a notched (square notched, like in the flooring department, for spreading tile bedding) trowel to apply a build layer or two, and 36 grit on your longboard to knock it down. Once the longboard and a long straight batten say the shape is fair, go back and fill the gaps left by the notches.

Use cheap, thin epoxy and offbrand filler powder unless you have stock in West...

micah202 wrote:..from everything I've seen,this 'time-consuming extra-step' would save MUCH time and frustration with the build overall

...and full length longitudinal stringers and shear clamps, IMO.

I've given out plans for this build jig:

...and to it I would also add some longitudinal stringers forward between f53 and 89 if I were to build again.

Chad wrote:
Use cheap, thin epoxy and offbrand filler powder unless you have stock in West...

advice of the month!
thanks Chad, I'll follow up on the flooring tool....actually own a couple.

Chad wrote:

micah202 wrote:..from everything I've seen,this 'time-consuming extra-step' would save MUCH time and frustration with the build overall

...and full length longitudinal stringers and shear clamps, IMO.

I've given out plans for this build jig:

Jig_iso.pdf

...and to it I would also add some longitudinal stringers forward between f53 and 89 if I were to build again.

....methinks that would help,,but -nothing- like building the hull upside-down on a full frame!
...as I say,it seems like it'd be a lot of work,,but I'm sure it'd build a better boat quicker.

...sorry,no PDF's

Sorry, I missed your "male" jig description, and assumed you were talking female.

I can see that assembling and glassing the hull panels on an upside down jig would help create a fair hull since a builder could more easily see the fair shapes, but then what?

I think the glassed hull shell would still be very wobbly, and then you'd need a female jig to hold fair while you installed the interior. Unless you propose installing the bulkheads up into the upside hull- you first!

I think this boat's hull skins are too thin and pliable to hold a fair shape without the interior parts. I think right side up in a female jig is the only reasonable way to hold the skins fair while adding the structure that keeps it fair.

The Portland folks are reporting reasonable success with their more elaborate female jig, and my hull came out very fair (except in places where I didn't have enough support as mentioned above), so I don't think there's a big problem that needs a radical new solution. Heck, even the no-jig builders achieved fair hulls, once they realized the need to introduce some lateral curvature to the frame sides.

Another solution might be to use 1/2" plywood on the bottom panels and then groove the edges so that the 1/4" panels sit in the groove. The low spots that I had were at the cradle frame locations and were generally because the side panel plywood slipped down relative to the bottom.

Filling the low spots was a pain, but it really didn't take that long although it was discouraging at the time because it's really hard to see the low spots until everything else is faired.

Phil

....I'll shift the discussion of male-plug to another thread entitled 'discussion of male plug'