And as I was thinking on it, I was already going to have the amidships stern gun on my I-boat mounted on a bracket to the subdeck; I'm thinking of doing like you did with my stern sidemount for access to the rudder servo without having to mess with my gun there when I pull the deck.
Awesome! Regarding the rib reinforcements, I was hoping there was an easier way. I guess it's only 34 ribs + bow/stern of tedious shaping work. I like the dowel idea. Thanks! John
You don't need to reinforce every rib. I always do the 1/8 stringers and every 2-3 ribs. Less in the stern, more in the bow. It's the direct fire from stern guns (aboves) that breaks the most ribs. The Bike started battling in 2000 and I fixed the first broken rib on it this weekend. It does not have as much glass in the hull as yours will. I typically stop the reinforcement under the waterline on most ribs. With having to tie in the casement deck level to the hull you should have 3 ribs that go all the way into the water channel.
The shaping goes pretty quick if you have a belt sander; I just sit the ship near the beltsander so I can leave the sander running, and do quick checks for fit with quick adjustments. If you look at the pics in my I-boat refit (should be near this post in the Builds section, I just updated it yesterday), you can see my reinforcements. If they weren't being backstopped by the water channel (yet to be installed), I'd probably extend them further down. But I need water channelling, so there we are. In any case, I like having the blocks of the waterchannel mechanically reinforce the bottom end of the rib reinforcements, as I like a mechanical joint vice trusting the epoxy.
Thanks! I had envisioned it looking a lot like Tugboat's Invincible. So, I probably will attempt to reinforce every rib. As the old saying goes, "Anything worth doing is worth overdoing." Thanks! John
NP I will have some pics Friday of the water channelling going in, that's one of the priorities now that I've committed to using the old 6V12AH lead-acid batteries Needed the ballast anyway. I will also have pics of emulating your gun mount. I've been thinking of how I would get the holes to line up in the deck, etc.
wow , seriously you guys blow my mind with these ideas. guess that's what happens when you mix intelligence and cash with a hobby. very cool guys.
Sorry, I haven't had the time to post. But, I did work on the following this past weekend: Rib reinforcement - 6 down, 28 to go... On a side note, West System epoxy seems much more exothermic than I remembered. I wonder if they've changed the formula. I cut/shaped the lower-center subdeck from 1/8" aircraft plywood. A rabbit joint on the stern subdeck is holding it in the rear. The infamous 'holy' LiFe battery box is presently supporting it at the bow. That's all for now. I'm going to keep plugging away at the rib reinforcements for the foreseeable future. Thanks, John
Wow, very clean work! I stay away from the West 205 hardener these days and only use the 206. On a warm summer day the 205 can kick off and ruin your batch in less than 10 minutes.
I am sure others will disagree, but my choices are based on experience.. I don't use west systems for adhesion only for sealing. There are many other products that work better for holding things together. I like the waterproof epoxy that Bob introduced me to, made by loctite. When dry it acts like a plastic and is very tough. I use this particular epoxy when backing ribs and stringers. When I have used only west systems to both seal and ahere things together, they break loose if I bang it with a battery, or tool.. or it gets shot too much. Something I ran into over time. Later, Johnny
Thanks! So, it's not only me... that's good to know. I'm using the 205 hardener and the first batch, which I cleverly decided to mix in a Dixie cup, actually began melting the cup in a matter of minutes. I'll have to learn to work quickly I'll keep the Loctite epoxy in mind if things begin falling out. I picked up the West Systems when I first started the project because, if memory serves, it was all the rage a number of years ago. Times change, I guess. Hopefully, I'll crank out a few more ribs today. Thanks, John
A word of caution regarding the loctite epoxy: Be sure to get the "waterPROOF" stuff. Terry Lee Mckinzie (McSpuds) and I ran into a bunch of problems at NATS this year because we didn't realize some of the epoxy we had used in our boats wasn't waterproof. Some of that stuff had been in my boat for 8 years (boat was in storage) and was hard as a rock. After a sink, it turned into mud!! Wet, slimy, NONSTICKY mud that let parts just fall out of the boat. Very un-good.
I had that problem back at Nats 2006 in my I-boat. Very frustrating to have the rudder servo mount simply detach from the hull...
After Johnny had posted I looked up the Loctite website. Many of their epoxies are not recommended for 'continuously wet areas or water immersion'. The marine epoxy is the obvious exception. 12 ribs down... 22 to go. Thanks, John
I just wanted to add I ordered some cups from smooth on for when I was planning to do molds and I have been using those repeatedly for mixing resin. I don't expect anyone to go buy them I just had them sitting around and so I tried them out and they work great. I have some throw away brushes that I leave in the bottom and when it dries up I just pull on the brush and out comes all the dried up remnants ready for the next round. Only draw back is don't leave to much resin left over to dry up because it won't come out and I have usually ruined the cup then.
Hello all: Life has gotten busy over the past month or so. However, I managed to devote some time to the Bayern project this past weekend. Though I didn't make any progress with the rib reinforcements, I did begin working on the casement area. I also created the barbettes from 3" OD clear tubing. That's all for now. Thanks, John
Hey John, Boat looks awesome, I really like your subdeck design. do you have any more photos etc? if you didn't get any photos of the rest of the build, it'd be neat to see in "Stem to Stern". Thinking of doing a Bayern as a second boat to match my Texas (get my friends into the hobby by having an evenly matched spare for them)
