The last uni rope, the big one on BH6 the saloon door bulkhead is done. I just have to remove the caps and the screws holding it down to be finished. I also glued the off cuts from BH5 back on. They are now ready for the strips or other panels to go onto them. This uni took a little longer than the others. It took me 4 hours to complete. And being only 15mm deep the caps will be holding the uni in tight as they did with BH4 but I guess I must have had a little more resin on this uni because not only was the rope a bit slipperier to transport but also more resin was squeezed out once the caps were pulled on tight. This wasn’t a problem just a bit more mess to clean up.
When the uni is completely wet on the plastic sheet (my method is to pour resin on the glass and spread it around with a squeegee), it is a fairly easy task to roll it into a rope, but a tip is to only do about 100mm at a time and roll the rope as you walk down the table along the ropes length, and when you get to the other end come back the same way doing another 100mm until you have rolled the 600mm wide sheet into a roll. If you try to do any more than 100mm you will find it starts to twist the uni threads and becomes a looser rope. You will find that as you roll the rope it will do itself for you up to about 500mm ahead but you will still need to tighten the rope by hand. Once the entire rope is rolled, simply fold the rope in sections small enough (500mm – 800mm works) to carry to the job. On the first uni I had the centre of the uni marked and I then just lined this up with the centreline and I started from the middle to one end pushing it down as I went, leaving the other half hanging on the bulkhead, but for the other 3 I found it easier to just start at one end and work to the other laying the uni on top of the trough, before pushing it down into the trough once I had it completely in place, again starting at the centre out to the ends.
I really didn’t find the uni’s to be a difficult task at all, despite the hype around how disliked the job is by builders in the past. I found them easy to do and satisfying in that it all went together well and another job that all Schionning builders have done in the past is ticked off my list.
The next task I have set myself is to finish the forebeam which I started last December and then put aside for the dinghies in January and February then we moved to the new warehouse in March. So I have the 2 halves made, the bottom half has the ply web in it, both the top and bottom halves have the uni and double bias inside, so I need to glue the anchor u bolts into a cedar block and glue and glass the block in then glue the 2 halves together. The I have to sand the glue smooth before uni and glass on the outside and a layer of bog whilst the glass is wet, and then of course I have to sand it to finish it.
Next weekend hopefully as I am busy working this week. Then after that is done I can finally start on the strip planking. I have looking forward to this for a while now.
