Keel Continued - Built, and Stem Installed

Sorry to anyone who has been following my build to this point.  We've been going through our busy season at work and just now we are starting to see it begin to wind down. 

Since my last post, I've received my shipment of fasteners from Clark Craft and I've been able to complete the building and assembling of my keel.  I have not glued anything at this point. Everything has just been dry fit together.  As I continued further up the keep, assembling the formers into place, I used a number of different ratchet clamps to hold the keel sides and bottom in its bent/formed position.  My sides were already pre-drilled using a 1/8 brad point drill bit.  When in place I used my tapered #8 bit to finish the hole through into the keel bottom followed by a SB fastener.  I think Todd mentioned in one of his posts that a valuable yet inexpensive tool that came in very handy when measuring angles was a t-bevel. This stands as one of the most used tools aside from my straight edge and rulers at this point. 

When it came to mounting my bow stem, I did not taper the keel sides to sit flat on the stem.  Instead, I cut them off flush with the front of the keel bottom.  I made sure that the vertical front edge of the keel sides were cut and sanded 90 degrees to the rear keel bottom planing surface.  I used my jigsaw to rough cut the notch in the stem bottom, and followed that with careful chiseling to get the precise fit.  Once the stem was set into place, I clamped the keel sides tight against it and used plywood shims on either side of the stem inside the keel (visible in photo) to hold it from shifting.  I also used a long 1 1/4 inch square steel tube run along the keel center to keep the horizontal plane of the stem 90 degrees to the keel back. (Malcolm Newbiggin used this method in his Candu Junior build). Once I felt the stem was square and in place, I drilled my holes using the 1/8 brad point bit followed by the #8 taper.

Just yesterday I started to number my pieces and disassemble the keel.  I also set up my router table and put a 1/2 inch round over on my stem edges.  The photos included below show the mentioned progress along with a few shots of my formers once disassembled from the keel.  I hope to start epoxying this week.

  

Keel Assembly Started

I started to assemble the keel dry.  I purchased a few 24 inch wide clamps that have been very helpful in clamping the pieces tight while pre-drilling the screw holes.  I have 3 former sections in place, but have now run out of screws and am awaiting my shipment from ClarkCraft.  (Earlier I said I'd be keeping all the fasteners in but I've already realized I will be removing the fasteners from the lowest portion of the keel to accommodate the 1/2 inch roundover on all the keel edges.  I guess this will give me about 60 screws I can use elsewhere in the build.)

I also have cut out the most rear section of the bottom/floor of the boat hull.  For anyone that is reading and might be worrying about me getting this out of my basement, don't fear.  Once I have the keel assembled I'll be building pieces in sections and assembling out in the garage when spring comes.
Here are some pictures that show my progress to date.

Keel Continued - Butt Joints

Over the last few days I have cut out the remaining pieces for the keel sides and bottom.  I have joined them using butt blocks.  I have pre-drilled and countersunk and will be using silicone-bronze fasteners to attach the blocks.  The fasteners will not be removed.  I plan on using silicone-bronze fasteners for clamping purposes throughout the build and will also be leaving these in.  It sounds as though silicone-bronze is the standard used by professional and amateur boat builders.  I opted to use these fasteners also, considering the nominal increase in overall cost. Included are a few pictures of the keel bottom and sides, dry fit together. 

Cutting out/fairing keel

Since my last post I have worked on cutting out my keel sections and fairing them up. Next I'll be cutting out the three 2 ft sections needed to bring the keel to it's 10 ft length.  I'll be mixing epoxy soon.  I've also included a shot of my douglas fir bow stem and the keel formers that have been roughly cut to size.  Things have been going slow but smooth so far.  I have a wedding to attend this Saturday so most of my weekend is spoken for.  I hope to have another progress post soon.
I'm pretty comfortable with my new Bosch barrel-grip jigsaw. It's a world of difference going from my Black and Decker.  Don't get me wrong, the Black and Decker does the trick, but...

Ice Broken

Tuesday morning I broke the ice by putting a pencil to the wood.  I spent about an hour and a half total in the past two days cleaning a space, collecting myself, and drawing out the beginnings of the keel.  I hope now that I have started I can try and do a little bit of work each day as I am dreaming of having it in the water sometime before the ice forms 2012. The pictures below show me in action. I used some t-pins to hold my faring stick on the marks while drawing my lines.  My plan for tomorrow is to build a couple sawhorses, get this sheet off the ground and start cutting out my keel. 

Introduction

Hello. My name is Ryan Wilson, and this blog is going to document the build of my first boat (well, that a human can sit in, that is).  I've been throwing the boat building idea around for a couple of years and I happened to stumble upon the Berkeley Engineering site, and I decided upon building a Perfect 10.  I hope my years of do-it-yourself-ing and building radio control aircraft and boats will give me an edge. 

It's been about 6 months since I decided on building the Perfect 10.  Since then I have ordered and received my plans from Berkeley Engineering, as well as I have acquired about 75% of the materials needed.  There are so many things to think of with a project like this, from all the different options (acx ply, marine ply, paint colour etc. etc.)  I decided to go with douglas fir marine plywood, and solid douglas fir for my stem and keel stiffeners.  The epoxy I'll be using for the build is Epoxy-Plus and GL-10 superglue developed and distributed by Clark Craft.

Much more to come.  Many things to think of as time goes on.  I hope to update as often as possible.  Of course any questions or comments are more than welcome.

This isn't the first Perfect 10 tugboat build to be documented. Todd Wiechman has been working on his Perfect 10 and documenting his build in fine detail.  Thanks to him, many of my questions have already been answered. Please visit his blog http://toddsminitugbuilding.blogspot.com/ but please, don't forget about mine!

 Until next time, here are some pictures of my trailer (built over my March Break holiday) soon to be converted to hold the Ferrous Pony, and a few photos of the Clark Craft epoxy.