It was another warmish weekend so I only managed a few hours each day. Yesterday I needed to glue panels together so until they set I couldn’t proceed anyway and today I attached them so again that was it for the day. 3 hours yesterday 3 hours today, for a total of 12 hours so far and about half way.

I am starting to run out of offcuts large enough to get the hull panels out in one piece. Remember this is the second dingy so it is not surprising that I would start to run out of larger offcuts. But I have enough larger pieces to make up panels long and wide enough to finish the second dingy by gluing them together. I glued the keel panels together on Saturday then attached them to the dingy on Sunday.

After I had glued the smaller pieces yesterday, I started today by cutting the keel panels to shape using the full size stencil I made from 3mm mdf (I have made a stencil of each panel from Warren’s dingy out of the mdf packing material that came with the pallets of panels). The keel panels are all cut slightly oversize and glued to the hulls oversize then are trimmed off once the next panels are butt joint attached and have set in place. After I had cut the keel panels to shape I marked then cut the kerfs. A tip here. We noticed that the kerfs cut more cleanly when the peel ply is left on and removed later. Without the peel ply the fibreglass splinters, no matter how you use the saw, fast or slow. Because I was gluing panels together to get the keel panels I had removed the peel ply already. So I needed to sand the splinters away before I could glue the kerfs.

Because of having to scrounge now for panels big enough I have had to make a compromise on how I made and attached the keel panels. On the first dingy we glued the panel down onto the upright inside hull panel. I just didn’t have panels wide enough to do that, I was short by 20mm so instead I glued my keels into the side of the inside panels. The only difference to the end result will be 20mm less bridgedeck clearance. This method was a little more difficult to glue as I didn’t have the curve to push down into to pull the panel down and also you can overhang the edge and trim it clean later. With the method today I had to try to exactly shape the panel to the curve and glue it to the flat inside edge. I did the best I could and filled any gaps with a glue/filler mix. I also had to trim the bulkheads down by 19mm (the thickness of a panel). In all I figure I added at least an hours extra work doing it this way.

Fortunately the panels are cut to oversize anyway so they can be trimmed again after the next panels butt into these but I don’t have much spare left now because I needed most of the overhang to get the shape trimmed correctly. In retrospect I probably had enough oversize to glue them in the normal way and if I was doing it again I would do them the easy way. I would have had to fill gaps here and there where the panels were not quite wide enough but I think it would have been less work. Once the glass is on the overall strength will be the same with either method.

Tomorrow I will glue the panels together to make the hull outside sides. Because of the cosmetic chamfer we put in these panels are not a wide now so I should be able to get them out pretty easily. I already have the tops sorted so once I have made the sides I am fine. I have plenty of panels large and long in 1 piece to make the chamfers.

I am almost there with the second dingy. Once all the panels are glued on I can start the filleting and taping. I figure that once the panels are all on I will be at about half way on this dingy.

I am almost there with the second dingy. Once all the panels are glued on I can start the filleting and taping. I figure that once the panels are all on I will be at about half way on this dingy.