Mast tube

Tonight we worked the candle out of the wrapped fiberglass that we laid up the night before. It took some work and some heat from a heat gun to soften the candle wax enough and even then we had to force it out with a wooden dowel.

Mast tube

I took an old candle and carved it to shape with a plane. You can see in the photo above the candle and next to it is a mast tube for Al's boat. The candle is wrapped in fiberglass and epoxy. When it is hard it will then be fitted in the hull and cut to fit. This step will probably be done when the keel box is fitted to the hull.

The top photo shows the candle wrapped with fiberglass and epoxy and setting up to dry.

Laying up more glass in the Hull

Here is the hull with the fiberglass strips fitted in place dry. We then mixed up some epoxy and covered the fiberglass cloth with it.

Hull and deck

Here are the hull and deck that was laid up from a mold. The hull that I ended up with was found to be a bit light and therefore not so stiff. We decided to add a few layers of glass to the inside of the hull to stiffen it up and to prevent flexing.

keel box construction

This evening I finished sanding my keel blade to final shape. We then wrapped some tape and put some mold release on the top of the blade so the keel blade will release from the fiberglass.

Keel blade work

Last night we did some work on the keel blade (again). We have to get the blade ready to make the mold for the keel box. The blade was filled with some micro-balloons and epoxy the night before to fill some low spots. Last night we sanded and sanded some more to remove the high spots. Some body filler was used to fill a few small low spots then sanded. Finally we sprayed some primer on the blade and found many small pinholes! We put a few coats of primer on and did some sanding as well.

My next step will be to sand the high spots down, and fill the remaining pinholes with some body filler and then sand down the filler and any high spots. Another coat of primer than a final sand to get the blade smooth. Then we can make the keel box.

I forgot my camera, but I hope to take some photos the next week when iI continue my work on the VEKTOR.

UPDATE - December 18, 2008

It has been quite a long time since I updated this blog and worked on my IOM so here is the scoop on what has been going on.

Some in our local group who built IOM hulls by laying up strips of balsa and covering with Fiberglass and epoxy discovered that these boats can leak water, causing the balsa to swell up. A hull plug was made of one hull design and and a mold was made of the VEKTOR.

Several VEKTOR hulls and decks were made for some of our group in order to increase our local fleet size. At this point 3 VEKTORS are in the water and 3 still remain to be built, mine being one of them.

I hope in the next few months to work and complete my VEKTOR. I ordered my servos (including back-ups) yesterday and they should be be here Friday. From Servo City I bought the following:

Sail Servo = HSR-5990TG Servo = 2 @ $99.99 each
Rudder Servo = HS-225MG Servo = 2 @ $27.99 each

Presently I am putting together my list of parts and pieces to complete the build. I have looked at ISOBAR's website and at MIDWEST's website for purchasing the items i think i need. I hope to make the order his afternoon.

I have some work to do on my hull and deck, mainly adding some fiberglass to stiffen the hull and some thinned out epoxy to the inside of the hull to seal up any pinholes that were noted o be in some of the other hulls made from the mold.

Christmas is fast approaching and do not think too much will get done for the next few weeks, but at least I will have all of my parts and pieces!