This is an archived message posted to the Kayak Building Bulletin Board. If you would like to ask a question about building kayaks, you can post a new message.
Hi Mick:
>When you laid up the overhanging glass, were the two halves of the >yak together w/ the non side masked w/ tape or whatever?
One of each. When I finished stripping the boat, I was dying to see it off the forms. The deck came off first and the forms stayed in the hull. I glassed the hull, on the forms with the deck removed and suspended out of the way. I used two layers to completely cover the hull, shear to shear. I did this to eliminate an edge to feather. The only seam is the tape joining the halves.
For the deck, I swapped halves, hoisting the hull, with the forms still in it, to the ceiling and glassed the deck. Only one layer on the exterior of the deck, and again shear to shear, of course. cut the overhang off green again.
In both cases, I completed the wetting out of the glass late at night (early morning, really) and trimmed the overhang with the utility knife in the morning, before work. The edge was ok, and when it was cured enough to be handled, actually, when the time came to join the halves, I found I had to really smooth some of the previously unnoticed drips with a surform scraper with a curved sole.
>When you trimmed it, would a sharp smoothing plane also work or is >the edge too fragile?
I would recommend both. Make the first cut green with a knife. Throw the excess (maybe a couple of inches) away. This would be a nightmare to try to plane away. If you can't get to it green, you may need a saw instead of a knife. Try not to be late. Once the bulk of the excess is removed, you can trim the remainder down very neatly to the level of the wood you like with plane. I used the curved surform.
Ed
btw, I have pics of the whole process at
http://sites.netscape.net/evalley
This is an archived message from The Kayak Building Bulletin Board.
Guillemot Kayak - High
Performance Wooden Sea Kayak Designs
