Sail Servo Bracket

I cut up some strips of fiberglass and laid them over a piece of 2 X 4 that had the edges rounded over by a router (Thanks Al!) to make up the bracket for the sail servo. This bracket will go athwartships forward of the mast and a hole will be cut in it to hold the servo. A total of 5 layers of glass were laid up, 3 of these layers were the full width and 2 small pieces were sandwiched in between the full length pieces in way of were the servo will be screwed into the bracket. I will take more pictures tomorrow so you can better see how this bracket will function.

Keel Box Installed

After 8 days in Alaska and then 3 days in Panama City, FL, it was good to be back home and to get some work done on the VEKTOR. This evening we put the hull in the cradle and then lined it up in Al's jig to get her straight and to fond the center-line with the laser sight. After we found the center-line we marked the location for the keel trunk. After discussing this with Hew, we moved the location of the keel and the trunk forward 1/4 of an inch as Hew says his VEKTOR does not have any weather helm and we figured this moving the keel forward will give the boat some feel of weather helm. You can see in the photo that the that the keel box is in place and I am putting some epoxy mixed with some adhesive type filler to thicken it up to a peanut butter consistency. This fillet was placed around the keel box. 3 strips if fiberglass was laid up on each side of the box and then 2 layers of fiberglass was laid up on the forward and aft ends of the box. These photos were taken with Hew's iPhone and i will take some additional photos tomorrow when we hope to get some more work done.

Bow piece

A bow piece was fabricated out of the scrap fiberglass that had epoxy on them and cured. I borrowed the mold that the hull came from in order to have the hull at the designed width and then traced out the stem piece on a piece of paper, transferred the drawing to the fiberglass and cut with scissors and then sanded to a tight fit. The piece was placed in the hull and then some thickened epoxy was mixed up with some filler and poured inside the hull and smoothed around the stem piece. I also put a small piece of fiberglass cloth over the thickened epoxy and pressed it in gently for added strength. Eventually a silicon bow bumper will be fabricated and attached to the hull. You can see from the photo that we left the hull bow down to set up over night. I will be travelling for a week and will not get back to this project until after the 25th of January. My thanks to Al and Hew for their help tonight.

Pinholes in the Hull

After the fiberglass that we laid up last night to stiffen the hull had cured,we put some water in the hull to check for any pinhole leaks. We did find a couple leaks, and as you can see by the picture, we marked them with a Sharpie and later put some epoxy inside the hull in the area of the pinholes. The pinholes we did discover were in areas where we did not add the extra fiberglas. I am thinking I may mix up some thinned epoxy and slosh it around the hull prior to putting the deck on. This will insure that any pinholes will be covered and not allow water to enter the hull. It is important to minimize the water getting in the hull as the cost of batteries, servos and the reciver are pretty high (water end electrical components do not mix well!)

keel box construction

Last night we also made the keel box. Tonight we removed the fiberglass keel box from the head of the keel blade. Eventually the keel box will be installed in the hull and glassed in. I do need to put a thin layer of epoxy on the outer surface to fill in any pinholes.

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.