Category: Kayak Construction

Building kayak(s?)

Joining finished, on to cockpit reinforcement

On Monday I turned over the panels to do the last side. Once again, I had to do a lot of scraping with a cabinet scraper to deal with epoxy that had seeped under the panel, and cutting with the carpet knife to try to restore the original edges of the piece. Rob came over to see how it was going, and it was good to have somebody to talk to while I worked, although it did distract me. I actually mixed the epoxy and was getting ready to apply it when I realized I hadn’t put any plastic wrap underneath, and was in danger of sticking the pieces to the work bench. Fortunately with two of us working it didn’t take long to put the plastic wrap under.

This fourth side benefited from the experiences from the other three, so it went pretty quickly and well. The only problem was that it also was harmed by how ratty the mylar sheets were – I got some voids because of gunk stuck to them, and because they’ve started to turn up at the edges a bit. Definitely next time I’ll buy enough mylar to use new ones each time.

Tuesday I finished that job, again with lots of cabinet scraper and sanding block and carpet knife action. And it was too cold to epoxy, which was just fine because I spend another half hour or so trimming the pieces that are going to be glued under the cockpit to reinforce it. It’s kind of strange that the kit comes with all these CNC cut plywood pieces, and then just two chunks of uncut plywood and instructions to cut the reinforcement (and later the seat) out of them. You’d think they’d cut all of the pieces.

Next job is gluing those pieces on, and then bevelling the shear edges. I’m not 100% sure how I’m going to do that. I suspect a Shure-form tool would be too agressive.

Kayak Construction, more joining

After paddling this morning, I worked on my kit boat a bit. Even though I was much more careful laying down the plastic wrap yesterday, I also used a lot more epoxy, so I still had a lot of epoxy on the “wrong” side to try to scrape down with a cabinet scraper and sandpaper block. As well as that, I also had to spend a lot of time trying to cut down the sides to shave off epoxy on the side (without cutting off any wood) with a carpet knife. It was time consuming work, but mostly it went ok – I think I cut down through the epoxy too far in one place and contacted the fiberglas tape. I also had one place on a very narrow piece (on panel 3) where the tape came right up for about half its width. I’m worried about that, and I wonder if I can glue that back down at some point where I have some spare epoxy. I’m going to have panel 3 out in the next step when I reinforce the bow deck panels, so I’ll have a go then.

After finishing the left side, I staked down the right side panels and taped and glued them. I tried a few different tricks – like to get a much flatter surface below some of the big seams, I nailed them onto one of the temporary forms wrapped in plastic wrap. Hey, by the time I’m finished I’ll probably know how to build this thing! I wonder if I should do another one after I’m done this one?

I also mentioned that I was getting concerned that the mylar sheets were getting a bit ratty? I discovered that you can peel off some of the dried epoxy, and that makes it a lot smoother. So they might do for the fourth side as well.

Kayak Construction, doing the other side

Ok, evidently I lied about it not getting warm enough to do any gluing today. I went to work and did all I can despite the VOB being broken, and when I came home the thermometer in the car said it was just over 70 degrees. Hey, that’s gluing temperatures, I thought to myself. So as soon as I got home I finished trimming and sanding the top side of the left side panels, and then flipped them over.
Continue reading “Kayak Construction, doing the other side”

Kayak Construction, not so bad on the next day

Today I took the weights and the mylar sheets off, and it doesn’t look too bad. The first one I did (the lower one in this picture) has some areas where the fibreglas weave shows through because it didn’t get enough epoxy, and it trapped some dirt in the epoxy in the part that wasn’t covered by the mylar. I tried sanding out the dirt and I think I got most of it. I’m not sure what I can do about the weave showing through, although it’s a lot more visible close up than if you stand back a bit.

The second one (the upper one in this picture) also has a bit of weave showing, but much less. It’s very smooth and shiny and I could almost be proud of it.

The rest actually came out much better. I think you can see a bit of weave on one or two others, but for the most part you can hardly see that there is fibreglas under there.

Today isn’t warm enough to do the other side, but I’ve got to go to work anyway. Tomorrow should be good. I’ll definitely use more epoxy, keep clean bricks close to hand, and use the brush to dab rather than brush the epoxy on the tape.

Kayak Construction, first glue, first problems

The temperature is finally over 65 degrees, so it’s time to start gluing. And it did not go well.

As per the instructions, I mixed up an ounce of epoxy. I painted some on the boards around the seams. Then I cut some of the fibreglas tape and put them down on the wet epoxy and painted some more to wet the tape. Problems:

  • As I painted the epoxy on the tape, the tape kept moving around. I ended up having to hold down the tape with my fingers (in the rubber gloves, of course).
  • As I was painting, one of the boards popped up a bit as a nail came lose. This made gaps and bubbles to painstakingly paint out.
  • Bits of fibreglas frayed off the edges and ends of the tape, and had to be carefully picked out of the epoxy.
  • other random dirt got into the epoxy and had to be picked out.
  • I ran out of epoxy in the middle of it and had to run inside and mix up another ounce.

With that all done, the second part was to cut some strips of mylar and put them on top of the tape, then squeegee it flat, and put weights on them. Problems:

  • I’d put the nails in the boards too close to the seams, so I had to remove them and move them back so the mylar would fit. Several times that lifted one of the boards, ruining all my previous work.
  • The instructions had said to weight them down with bricks. I didn’t think I had any bricks, but I figured all the scrap 2x4s I had could be piled on top. Unfortunately, it turned out that the 2x4s weren’t heavy enough, and things were popping up. With the glue hardening quickly, I had to improvise. I found a pile of half-bricks in a dingy corner of the garage and pressed them into service. Unfortunately they were filthy, and got dirt all over everything. I’m hoping none of it got below the mylar sheets.

    • I’m not looking forward to tomorrow’s reveal to see just how ugly these joints look. Hopefully it will be like my canoe, where I know where every blemish is but everybody else just sees the overall beauty of it.