Having got most of the structure dry fitted, I then started the gluing. For this I mostly used Gorilla glue, which seems to glue almost anything to almost anything else pretty effectively. You do need to clamp pieces in position as the glue foams and expands, and might push a piece out of place if not held firmly. Pic 1 is the mast deck glued in. The instructions suggest cutting the hole for the mast tube before fitting, but I felt I was more likely to get the hole exactly central if I cut it in situ. Pic 2 is this in progress, using a burr in a Dremel flexi drive to open the hole out, and pic 3 is the finished hole.
Pic 4 is the mast tube and the marked out lower support, which sits down in the hull and locates and braces the mast tube. I made a mess of cutting this hole and had to add a piece to cut a new hole as you can see from the dry fitting of the tube, pic 5. The mast tube normally comes with the kit, but Alan Horne was out of stock and pointed me to
PJ Sails for this part (and I also ordered most of the hardware I think I will need from here, not to mention a suit of sails). I commend Peter Wiles for great service – I spoke to him before I placed my order and mentioned I really needed the tube now, so he took my address and posted it to me before even receiving my formal order, let alone any payment. Thanks Peter!
I didn’t complete the installation of the structure at this point as I still had to make and fit the sail winch assembly, so that was the next step. I did some experimenting and found my sail winch (a Hi Tec HS-785HB) makes 4 full turns on the full throw of the transmitter stick. That amounted to about 50cm of travel, which was rather more than I believed I needed. As my transmitter (Planet T5) has no end point adjustment, I initially thought I would need some sort of physical stop on the transmitter. However, I reckon I am going to need about 25cm travel so the simple thing to do is use a 2:1 on the winch line. This would have several effects –
1. I get the correct range of movement – good
2. The strain on the winch is halved – good
3. The time to sheet in or out is doubled – bad
So two good things and one bad. As I am not going to race the boat (at least not seriously), the sheeting speed isn’t critical, and I hope for more of a stately progress around the lake as opposed to a frantic flurry at a mark. So I went with the 2:1, with an elastic to keep the tension on the winch line.
The suggested sheeting system uses a slider on a rod or track. Alan Horne recommended Silent Gliss curtain track, but I looked at the price (over £20 for a 1 metre length) and decided I would use what I had to hand. This turned out to be some 8mm carbon tube and a sheet of PTFE. I made up a PTFE slider using the brass screws provided for the wooden parts, and although I might have done a neater job, it slid very nicely along the carbon tube (pic 6). I then lashed together a trial setup to make sure I hadn’t made a complete faux pas somewhere (pic 7), and everything seemed to work fine. The elastic in the picture is a little fierce, but was all I had to hand. I will substitute something a little gentler in the final setup. A close up of the jury rigged slider is in pic 8. This whole assembly is removable from the hull, so if it turns out to be less than effective, I can modify or replace it fairly easily.
Once I had convinced myself I could make this all work, I was ready to install the fixed part of the sheeting system in the hull and complete gluing in the wood structure. However, before that I acted on a suggestion from Alan Horne, namely to fit something to the ballast to provide a lifting point that didn’t rely on the deck and hatch structure. I had some stainless M4 studding, so that seemed to fit the bill. I drilled a hole in the aluminium strap that holds the trim weight in place and fitted the studding, pic 9, in what I judged to be the balance point of the hull. Then the remainder of the wooden parts were glued in, assisted by various clamps and elastic bands, pic 10. In this picture you can also see the base for the sheeting system in place, along with the removable section which carries the winch and moving parts. You can also just see on the right clamps keeping the hull beam within tolerances as the glue dries. The top of the hull is still quite flexible and can easily be pushed out of shape, something to watch when gluing these pieces in.
Coming along nicely! A few more details internally then on goes the deck.
Greg