While I have been waiting for the kit to arrive, I constructed the cradle for the boat. Construction of the cradle was very simple (~1hr) and the materials cost less than $100. (Note: Much of the lumber could be scavenged---the most expensive parts are the casters ($9 ea. at Home Depot). In short, I screwed and glued together two 2"x4"x12' s to two 2"x4"x4' s to make a large rectangluar frame. I then cut a 2'x2' piece of 1/4" doug fir plywood from corner to corner to create four triangles to place in the corners of the frame to keep it from racking. The triangles of plywood were screwed down using 3" deck screws and the locking casters (3" wheel dia.) were fastened to the frame using the same 3" screws.
I basically setup the cradle to carry the load of the boat from between frame 18 and frame 53.5 and frame 169.5. Two more cross pieces were added at the locations for frames 89 and 124. During initial constuction I suppose I can support the bow and stern with blocking as needed.
The last step in constuction of the cradle will be to fasten the plywood cutouts (i.e. the negatives of the frames) provided with the kit which match the shape of the hull.
After flipping the cradle over, there semmed to be quite a bit of flex over the 12' length of the cradle so added a couple of additional casters to coincide with frame 89.
Here are a couple of pictures of the progress so far:
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1 comment:
Looks good Jeff.
I found that I needed to hold up the bottom hull panel at the transom as I was stitching. I used a floor jack and some scrap 2x4 blocks for this. I found that this gave me a firm place to enter the hull while getting the frames positioned. With frames in and filleted the support wasn't needed any more.
While stitching and installing frames you may want to use shims to level your cradle and keep it from moving. I added the wheels after I was past that point.
Keep us posted. Kevin.
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