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Trailers, Tactics

Discovered a couple interesting things this week.

First, on a trip to Fisheries Supply, I saw an interesting trailer - the Rack and Roll. It seems pretty cool - you can fold it up and store it alongside the garage wall. That would be nice. The killer may be the weight limit - 250 lbs. I'm not sure a Swift will fit under that.

Next, I discovered Fisheries sells stainless steel square drive wood screws. I had been getting mine from McFeely's Square Drive (along with stainless 10-24 tee-nuts, which I like), but Fisheries actually has a better selection, and hey, they're local. They don't have machine screws though - pity.

Finally, I found out what this triangular thing was, installed on Bram's mast step. It's a Tack Tick Microcompass, so you can track windshifts. Maybe in a few years...

Installing blocks

Installed a couple more blocks this week. These take time - there's plenty of measuring, positioning, drilling, and preparation before you can actually take the leap and install something.

First, I installed all the cleat bevel blocks. I had already measured and positioned them; next I drilled pilot holes for screws. I'm using four screws: three 1” #8 screws in the top, and one 3/4” #6 at the narrow edge. Also drilled pilot holes in the block itself.

Next, tape all the holes in the deck, and fill holes in the deck and blocks with straight epoxy (so the wood sucks it up and makes a tighter bond to the screw). Then, slather on some epoxy/silica/404, then position on the deck and hold it down tight while driving the screw from the underside of the deck.

I also bonded the pole launcher deadeye backing block into place - forgot to sand the underside of the hull here (oops).

The next big set was the backing blocks for the spinnaker sheet, and the bevel control blocks. The spin sheet I had to go out and find a larger eye strap, to match up with the ratchet block - the block is pretty sturdy and I didn't want the mounting to be sub-par. I then drilled the holes (at a slight angle; that seems to be what others are doing). The actual backing block is a circular piece of bulkhead material, plus a 2" wide piece of the fibreglass/hybrid sheet. The fibreglass is very strong - there's no way to pound a leg of the tee-nut through it. So all the legs are flattened out.

Next step was to drill holes for the centre bevel blocks. I had already drilled the holes for the blocks so they were correctly placed; at this point I just drilled through the deck. Next step was to put the backing block in place and drill through it. Because these blocks are right in the middle of the deck, you can't have a hand on top as well as below - so I slipped the block between the forms and the deck, and drilled there. Be sure to write on the backing block which side is which, and which side is up.

Getting ready to glass the bevel blocks in place. I cut away some of the station so the screws had somewhere to go. I then sealed the holes. The first block was the transom block - this used 6-32 screws and hex nuts. I'm not sure this will work - it seems like the nuts are too willing to slip out from the bond of the epoxy. And you can't buy 6-32 stainless steel tee-nuts. Next up was the spinnaker control - this used 1/4” bolts. Finally the bevel block. I installed this and slid all the screws through so it was positioned correctly; then I got underneath and fitted in the backing block one screw at a time. Again I used the 6-32 hex nuts; I had to wake Tamara up to drive the screws from the top while I held the nuts in place on the bottom.

The screws I drove into the bevel blocks were lightly greased; the ones for the spin sheet weren't greased at all. When I came back seven hours later (couldn't sleep) and tried to move the spin sheet screws, I found they were very tightly bonded in place, and I was lucky to be able to get them out. Lesson: grease every bolt you install when you're bonding these in.

[Update 2006 Feb 17: Now that I have the deck and hull touching each other, I realized another important point. These two bevel blocks should be positioned far enough apart so that there is room for the centreboard insert to be put in position. Keep that in mind...]

[Update 2006 Nov 14: There was a conversation about how to best install the backing plates, and Bill provided this wisdom (as Bill always does):

Steve,

I see from Bram's and others' replies that you have received some good advice on how to proceed. As far as measurements are concerned, locating the plates on the underside can be accomplished by using your tape measure and T-squares on the underside of the deck. I also used a laser level that has a sight for horizontal lines and a swivel compass base to throw a straight line in any angle of 360 degrees. The laser I used has the ability to cast a line on a curved surface as long as the base is raised high enough above the arc to reach over the crest and down the other side. This came in handy on the underside of the deck when it was placed bottom-up on my stands. The deck is supported by pieces of particle board, attached to the stands, that are cut to fit the contour of the deck top. The laser that I used may be available in Australia, so check www.strait-line.com for their STRAIT-LINE Laser Level 120. Just be careful to measure twice and cut once, as I goofed on the holes for the spin halyard RF30141 block and had to drill the correct holes over by one inch. You can mark your measurements easily with a black marker pen, as no one will see this side when you are done.

When you place the backing plate centered where you want it, tape or clamp it down on the underside of the deck, place the part you are attaching on the backing plate in the correct position as if it was on the deck. Drill thru the part, backing and deck, being careful to slowly cut thru the s-glass to prevent delamination ( force of the hot drill is against the underside of the s-glass). Remove the backing plate and re-drill the holes to the size of the T-nut body. Install the T-nuts into the backing plates after coating the drilled holes in the deck and backing plate with some epoxy to seal the wood. I attached the backing plates by sanding the underside of the deck lightly around the installation points and applied epoxy/406 to the backing plate. The T-nut holes were filled with heavy axle grease and the machine screws lightly coated with the same, to prevent epoxy from filling the hole. Install and clamp the backing plate by first inserting the machine screws with large fender washers up thru the deck and then lowering the backing plate onto the screws. Twist the screw into the backing plate a couple of turns before lowering the plate onto the deck, so that the holes will line up and the epoxy will be prevented from entering the T-nut. Once the plate is lowered onto the deck underside, proceed to tighten the screws from underneath and you will have a nicely fitting and well-clamped backing plate. Any grease that extrudes from the T-nut should be carefully scooped up to prevent contamination of the backing plate. Any epoxy that oozes out, can be used to seal the edges of the backing plates. Below is an early picture of the set-up. Let me know if you have any questions regarding the technique. Good luck.

Bill Scheumann
USA020 and USA040

[Update 2007 Jul 18: I also dug up an article about how to best mount hardware. One thing that's interesting from that article is that the holes for the bolts are drilled out very large, and filled back in again with epoxy. That may have been a better strategy than what I did - time will tell.]

[Update 2007 Aug 01: I have to say, I should have drilled the through-the-deck holes for the bolts a bit larger than I did. I drilled them so the threads would just fit through the hole; I should have gone up 1/32 of an inch in width. The problem with the holes at the exact width is that the bolts tend to seize in the holes - and getting them out is tough. If I drill, I risk drilling into the nut or in the wrong direction.]

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Installing the spin pole saddle

More positioning of blocks and drilling holes this week, and I installed the spinnaker pole ring saddle.

First, I positioned the bevel cleat blocks. I set these up so they are centred at the exactly correct distance, and point at the location where their lines come from - the fore block points at the mast, the aft block at the bevel blocks in the centre of the deck. The aft block has to be positioned just far enough away from the step so that it's front edge doesn't interfere with the shock cords exiting the toe rail (about 1" in my case).

I also positioned the centre bevel blocks.

Next up was to actually install the spin pole block and cheek block. First was the cheek block - it fits underneath the spin pole backing block. So: pound in the t-nuts, remove, coat the hole in epoxy/silica/404 mix, coat the inside of the t-nut in grease with a paperclip, slather the top of the block in epoxy/silica/404 (leaning toward the 404), and you're ready to go. I then used some cheap zinc screws covered in grease to screw down from the deck top and hold the block in place

Next it's time to install the actual spin saddle. First, I had to re-drill all four screw holes - the first crack I made the holes parallel to the edges of the block. That caused the inner edges of the heads of the flathead screws to stick out into the ring - which would have torn up my spinnaker pole. So I re-drilled all the holes so they came out the bottom of the block right next to the edge. Each hole had about three exit holes - it took a bit to figure out the best angle.

Were I to do this again, I would have taken the ring, passed the screws through it so they were flush, and used the angle they came out the ring to determine how to drill the holes in the block (duh).

I had previously soaked all those holes in epoxy, so they wouldn't take on water. Now, I filled them with the epoxy/silica/404 mix, slathered some on the bottom of the saddle block, and some on top. Roughed up the bottom of the ring (which I bough from Roger at Aquilo Boats when I was in Calgary). Slather a *lot* of filler in the middle of the plate. Pass the screws through the ring and saddle block, and start screwing them into the t-nuts on the other side.

Then it's just a process of adding in more filler until the entire plate/deck space is full. Tighten up the screws, clean up the ring, and that's it.

[Update 2007 Oct 15: I learnt at the 2007 Swift Regatta that this backing block should really be much larger - one of the round pieces would have been better, perhaps even with some of the high-load glass/hybrid backing. Robert had to drill another inspection port through his bow because he ripped this fitting out (gulp).]

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Working on toe rails, installing hardware

I continued working on the toe rails this week.

• First, I routed the channel in the rail. I was going to do this with a router table, but in conversations with Max he suggested I just freehand it. So - freehand the groove all the way down the end. tip: Watch out for the end where the router suddenly changes resistance and wants to head off in strange directions. Also, make sure to indent the groove at least 1/2" from the outer edge - the width of a RF20711 exit scheve.
• Sand the routed groove.
• Mix epoxy/silica to light cream consistency (around 4 squirts), and splotch a bunch in the groove.
• On top of a sheet of plastic, paint 2" wide glass tape with epoxy
• Wrap the plastic around a spare strip (glass side out)
• Insert strip into groove, clamp in place, and allow to cure.
• Once cured, apply to belt sander, and return to installable.

Next you make the strips to install in the bottom of the routed groove.

• Plane down two strips to about 1/4" x 1/4". They should have a slight angle - looking at the end you'd see an isosceles trapezoid with the angle at about 10° off vertical.
• Seal them with epoxy.
• Bond them into the channel - about 1/8" should be sticking out, and gets sanded/planed off once everything cures. You need quite thin epoxy/silica for this step, very thin cream.
• When cured, sand everything back down, and the toe rails are ready to go.

I also measured and drilled the holes for the pole launcher cheek block, pole launcher deadeye, spinnaker retrieval block, and placed the cleat bevel blocks.

While all this was happening I also built a second shelf and rail on which to hang clamps.

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Rigging pictures

I was getting a bit confused on which blocks go where, so I decided to pay Bram's boat a visit and see what was going on. He has two - a VMG skiff and his own. I spent most of the time taking pictures of the VMG - it represents the latest thinking on rigging. Here's the pictures.

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There are also a bunch of pictures which Bob Lewis took a while back of one of Bram's boats. They're here. And don't forget the other pictures of VMG's skiff I took in May. And finally, I took some more pictures of the VMG when it was at Boats Afloat.

Preparing pole ring saddle

Started to install deck hardware. I'm missing the bolts I want for the deck mounting - I want to use square drive bolts (call me a Canadian). As it happens these are tricky to find in the US, especially if you're looking for stainless steel. So I have to order them.

While I'm waiting for parts to arrive, I measured and drilled the pole ring saddle. To ensure the ring was centred correctly, I carefully measured the exact centre of the block and between the holes in the ring, and then aligned up the mid-points. I also cut the backing plate; this is a single plate, which will have plenty of filler when I actually bond everything in place. I've seen pictures where these are two separate pieces, but in a conversation with Bram he recommended just one.

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