Saturday, July 25, 2009

Happy Trails

Well, at least one thing is actually done: the trailer.



I wanted to be sure the trailer was ready before the boat was painted so that it could be flipped right onto the trailer. To finish off the trailer, I painted the bunks with an oil-based paint (grey to match the galvanizing) and then glued polyethylene foam to the supports that would contact the hull. A little "googling" suggested that plain old Weldwood Contact Cement would do the trick in gluing a normally tough-to-adhere polyolefin like polyethylene to the wood. At six hours in so far, so good. :) Now if the boat fits in there I'll be all set.

I also got another coat of epoxy on the hull, but that looks just like it did two days ago before I sanded so I didn't post a picture.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

careful you dont leave a boat on foam pads like that for ages - can give you no end of problems with moisture ingress if it doesn't have the opportunity to dry out.

good stiff astroturf / doormat is excellent, as , combined with foam, it cushions the boat, and lets air circulate. (and is cheap as chips)

Jeff Dalsin said...

Thanks for the tip! The foam in closed-cell polyethylene so it should not absorb much, if any moisture. But I will definitely look into the astro-turf.

Jeff

Tokyo said...

watch that "split" rear bunk! where you have those guides for the bulb the bottom of the cradle sticks out into that V. might want to round it off or something just so you dont smash the leading edge of the keel on the sharp corner!