Let the big epoxy pour begin! -- 302hrs

Happy summer solstice to everyone. I hope everyone enjoyed this longest day, northern hemisphere folks a least:) I was up at the crack of dawn but didn't get time to work on Tiki until the late afternoon.

All wired and aligned, ready for epoxy!

This week has been exciting and tedious. Tiki is finally looking like a boat, the exciting part, and long hours of alignment and tweaking of bulkhead, tedious part. I've been managing to get a couple hours a day on Tiki so progress is being made. This week has all been about installing bulkheads and final stitching up of the hull. Each bulkhead seemed to have a unique issues, e.g.   bulkheads 1, 3, 6, and 7 all needed the lower ends narrowed to get a proper fit. Talk about tedious, I think I had BH6 in and out 5 times before I was happy with the fit.

Modification to lower bulkhead for tighter fit.

Check out these pictures of the plans, sure looks like a goof to me.  Sheet 1 of the  plans show the lower edges as 20mm wide while the matching keel, stem, sternpost and timbers are all 18mm wide.
Then sheet 2 appears to show that the bulkhead bottom edge is level with the hull sides. But the bulkhead sides from the lower side notch is longer than the hull side at the corresponding location, for instance BH7 was 10mm longer. I wonder if newer plans have changed in these areas, I bought mine for hull #164 2nd hand so I have no idea how old these plans are but the sign off date is 1993. A lot can change in 20 years, I know I have:)

10mm half measure at bottom, equals 20mm total width.

Two 9mm Ply pieces is 18mm. 

Looks like the bulkheads end above the keel bottom, even with
the hull sides. 

I didn't pick up these discrepancies until the wiring began and there were either large bulges at each BH or wide gaps along the timbers.

Once bulkheads were installed a lot of time, maybe too much, was spent aligning the hull, i.e. getting all the bulkheads between the stem and stern lined up. Also making sure each bulkhead was vertical and perpendicular to the keel backbone. I used a laser level with it clamped to the stem or stern to check the bulkheads. I suppose this may be overkill, I don't expect most Pacific Island Wharram builders use anything more sophisticated than an eyeball and piece of string. But the task is done, time to start the epoxy process and lock it down, and in the process this hull becomes, theoretically at least,  able to float! That's a nice milestone:)

Then finally today once I was happy with the alignment, the big epoxy pours began, .75 cups per mix:) Probably 1/3 to 2/3 drips out as I'm intentionally making the first pour thin enough to get in to the joint completely. It will take several pours over a couple days before the keel is done.

Finally...Looks somewhat like a boat:) -- 250 hrs

I've had a couple good days working on TIki #164. The rudders are damn near complete, just some fairing and drilling out the hinge holes on the starboard rudder. But the big advancement came with stitching the starboard lower hull, keel,stem,stern post, and two milled keel timbers together and dropping the collection in to the two cradles.

BH1, not stitched, just spreading the lower hull sides.

BH4 goes immediately forward of the butt strap in view.

The first real challenge started with trying to install BH4, which is the first to be installed following the build instructions. First thing I noticed was the aft floor and bunk bearers were too long(not the only problem unfortunately) or should I say they were full bulkhead width IAW sheet 2 drawings. The problem was that BH4 is right in front of a hull side butt strap. Which is clearly shown on another sheet. So the fix was to remove 6mm off each end of the aft bearers. Not a big deal but just another delay, but with a back saw from an old miter box set and couple sharp chisels and the job was done.

Removing 6mm from the floor bearer.

Then there was the forward keel timber, an 18mmx45mm milled piece that also needed the aft end tapered, which I didn't realize until the hulls were stitched up and sitting in the cradles. So out came the sharp chisels. Good chisels are becoming my favorite tool.

Really don't what to sound negative, in fact I'm really happy seeing the hull setup, but if your building a Tiki 30 these are issues to watch out for. No more progress for a couple weeks as we head out to pickup another boat in Maryland. But before closing up shop I discovered another problem with starboard BH4 and this time the the problem is completely on my shoulders, the floor bearer is to high! The bearer is about 8mm high when the bunk bearers are flush with the lower hull side top:(  A few  quick measurements show that my build tolerances added up a few millimeters here and there. Oh well, something to ponder, best way to "fix" this error, on the long drive to Maryland.

Lower Hull Sides almost ready -- 106 Hours

All 30 clamps I bought from Harbor Freight and a few extra C-clamps were used attaching the stringer along the upper edge of the lower hull sides. Getting that 27ft length aligned with the hull edge was a little tricky. I finally settled on using small nails to first tack the stringer in place then used the clamps to apply even pressure along the length. After two days of cure the nails are easily removed leaving on small holes to later fill.

Scott Williams on his Tiki 26 uses drywall screws for this type thing but I found they tend to push the two pieces apart before joining. The screws need to be screwed down to pull the pieces together but that seems like too much pressure. The small nails work good for me, your mileage may vary.

My next task is up in the air. The build plans show stitching the hull sides to the backbone, stem and stern post then on the next page show installing the bulkheads. I think I’ll build the bulkheads first so I don’t have the stitched hull taking up space.

First Scarfs - 98 Hours

Inside that mass of clamps are the joined scarfs of two 16 ft and two 12 ft long 20mmx45mm stringers for the lower hull sides. I guess it might be a little overkill, but no worries if it works and the great news is that these stringers are the last pieces needed to get me off page one of the build manual!!!

This was also the first use of the newest tool to enter my collection,
a Ryobi AP1301 Planner, cheapest one I could find at Home Depot:). I rough cut using the table saw then send the stringers through the planer to get the exact dimensions. Then I used the Ryobi Hand Planer I picked up a few weeks ago to make the scarfs.

18 mm Plywood - 28 Hours

If speed is more important than cash then I would suggest buying one sheet of 18-mm plywood instead of two sheets of 9-mm to build the Stem and Stern Posts. With the 9-mm two copies of the stem and stern posts must be laminated together to get the 18-mm thickness shown in the plans. In the pic the two stem posts are complete and one stern post is cut and ready for gluing.

My guess would be that at least an extra two hours were needed to build up these parts as opposed to just cutting out of a single piece of 18-mm. I had priced the 18-mm but I don’t remember the cost difference between 1 sheet of 18 vs 2 sheets of 9, but it must have been enough to trigger my frugality alert.