Cackler Saga continues..... Combing and Sheathing Deck

Bill Burruss

Well-known member
All,

Good evening. Continuing on with the build, right after we had the engine installed it we decided to deck the area between the motor mount and the rear bulkhead. It really took having the engine in place to make it easy to visualize. While not in the plans, decking this area should provide additional protection from rear rolling waves, environmental protection for the battery and fuel filter, make it easier to camouflage the boat, and add a lot of strength to the motor mount area. To do this right, as well as paint the boat, the engine had to come off. Before this, the biggest outboard I had wrestled with was the 106 lbs Yamaha 25hp 2-stroke on my BB2. Would not call it easy or truly ?portable? as Yamaha classified it, but I was able to manhandle it onto and off the back of the boat. For this Tohatsu 205 lbs beast that is attached to a 40 lbs break away, I pulled out the shop crane to lift as one unit. Fortunately the engine has a convenient lift bracket permanently installed. I made an engine stand out of 2x6 recycled from the boat cradle to hold the engine until we were ready to reinstall it.


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When we purchased the engine, the dealer mentioned he thought we ought to reinforce the 1.5 inch thick motor mount to support the 245lbs+ motor and breakaway. The plans called for making the motor mount from 2 pieces of ? ply laminated together. I am not sure the extra wood was needed, but I went ahead and added a piece of half inch ply as it was easy to do at this point in the build and certainly does not hurt anything.


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For the combing, I started with the front piece and worked back. To scribe the bottom curve, I just traced the deck. To scribe the top line, I made this high speed jig by drilling a hole in a piece of 2x4 to hold a pencil. This actually worked really well. The band saw made quick work of cutting the lines.


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There have been several older boat restorations on the site lately where the combing has come loose, so I made sure the combing was screwed into solid wood at the ends so it cannot move. The screw in the first picture below goes thru the ply into a 1 inch thick Doug Fir deck beam. The font combing board has a countersunk screw inboard of and parallel to the first screw and screwed into that same deck beam. I then ran a horizontal screw from the front combing into the end of the side combing. Hopefully this will hold tight. After that it was just a matter of bending the combing to maintain the right distance from the outer edge of the boat and running screws from the underside deck countersunk up into the combing. Screws in the combing over the sponsons are countersunk and screwed all the way into the Doug Fir deck beams; again, trying to make sure they never break free. The 1 inch pine boards were easy to bend and a pleasure to work with. Thank-you Eric for the help with these. Now the boat had all its lines.


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Once laid out, I took the combing back apart and reattached with epoxy and peanut butter. Fortunately my brother came over and gave me a hand with this part of the build. Bending and holding the combing precisely to the pencil line while it has slippery epoxy on the mating surfaces and trying to sink a screw is not really a 1-person job. It is an easy 2-person job, though. Once the combing was epoxied down, it was time to make sure all the holes were filled and corners/edges rounded with a round over router bit or sander. Even the SS steel screws were no match for the 7 inch polisher.


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I went ahead and did the fillet/tape work on the edges of the deck over the splash well where it intersected the sponsons to make a smooth transition so it would be easier to glass the deck. If you have ever worked with glass, then you know it does not do well over sharp bends.

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Up next, glassing the deck and first water.

Have a great evening!

-Bill


















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Cackler Saga continues, Combing and Glassing

All,


Good evening. Am done getting ready to recon for ducks tomorrow (Alabama opens next weekend), so I though I'd continue on with the posts on the Cackler build. After the deck edges and combing were properly rounded and all the bumps sanded it was time to start glassing. We worked from front to back, and I like to get the sheathing and tape all in place for each section before moving on so that the epoxy gets a good chemical bond. I seem to recall Tod Osier having some positive comments about using peel ply, so this time I actually tried it. It did smooth out the fiberglass which made for less work fairing, as well as prevented a lot of the air bubbles. Wish I had started using it sooner.

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Peel ply in place:

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It seems like a waste of material to place all that fiberglass and epoxy just to sand it off during the fairing process, so I built up the low spots on the seams and other divots with epoxy/micro-balloon mix and sanded smooth. The micro-balloon fairing compound is a lot easier to sand that wood-flour epoxy mix or fiberglass. The balloons seem pricy, but I think they are worth the expense.

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While I was dragging my feet getting the boat finished, my son custom ordered the trailer from Tennessee Trailer and picked it up at their factory. We wanted to verify the fit and make any needed bunk/guide/winch tower adjustments, so we towed the boat down to the river and floated it off, tested it on the new trailer, and put back on the old trailer for painting. I cannot confirm or deny, but since this was first water the boat may have been christened with a can of Yeungling.


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To get ready to paint, I installed all the hardware that would be painted over. This included the bow lights, which you can see being tested below. Over the years I think the wart style bow lights on my Broadbill and BB2 have been the most replaced non-wear items. These side mounted ones should not have the same problem running into things like the underside of docks and bow-stops. We also installed loops along the edges to hold future camouflage material. Bronze cleats were difficult to find, and seem to have really gone up in price. I found the aft pair on Ebay. For the front, I found one that is held down with 4 screws to make sure it could take abuse.


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Up next, painting.

-Bill
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