Holy Clamps Batman!

I started this weekend by filleting the cross deck in place. Temperatures in Phoenix spiked on Friday to a whopping 100 degrees which made the pot life on the filleting material shorten up considerable. I let it set up overnight and started Saturday morning by test fitting and trimming the cross deck doublers.

Test fitting the cross deck doublers

As you can see by the picture it took quite a few clamps to get the different pieces situated on the top of the cross deck to figure out how it fit and what needed to be trimmed. I also made the move to cut the hole in the bow transom for the spinnaker pole. Always fun drilling a big hole in the front of your boat! I used a 65mm hole saw that I special ordered from Lowes to do the job.

Once trimmed I proceeded to test fit the cross deck doublers in their ultimate position underneath the cross deck to make sure that the epoxy process would go smoothly. I also took the opportunity to sand down the epoxy fillets under the cross deck prior to epoxying the doublers into place.

Once I started epoxying the doublers in place it became an "all clamps on deck" exercise. I ended up using every single clamp I own, plus an additional 5 from my neighbor to get everything to come out nice and tight. It ended up looking like a clamp porcupine!

Next steps will be to install the mast steps, the rub rail on the inside/outside of the bow transom, the spinnaker pole support, and the spinnaker guide beam and the assembly portion of the hull will be done!