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Spindrift 10 build


Stareed

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Good day all,

I have been working on this Spindrift 10 quietly in between my Merchant Marine job, three kids and my "other" job of owning my own carpentry business when I am off the ship. I received the plans  months before I started. And as with most of you, life has a tendency of getting in the way whenever you say " I am going to make some headway today, this week, this month". I cut out all the parts and got the boat stitched up in May, took the summer off and got back to it in Oct. considering since May I have only had two and a half months off I dont think Im too bad off. Cost....did I mention I have three kids! anyway my wife almost had a heart attack when four sheets of plywood cost 400 bucks so I have been slowly spending money, the below pictures are the result of TWO quarts of resin and the hardener. Please dont freak out, I have only tacked the panels and full on glued the stringers,gunwales ect. I was very careful to watch out for twist and fairness along the way and think its pretty good so far, but Im a boat driver not a boat builder yet so I may be wrong. You'll notice the plans in the boat looking very well used, I have read them so many times I barely need to look at them anymore ( I still do to make sure of stuff) and I have a "shop" set and a study set. B an B has no need to worry about me making copies...the shop set will be worn pretty thin by the end. I wish I could just work on it all day everyday, I love building things out of wood and boats sure beat the sh#t out of anything else in my opinion. 

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Hi Stareed,

Your biggest mistake was telling your wife how much things cost. When it comes to boats you always have to divide the cost by at least half and even then they will still say gee that's expensive. Surely you don't think that she tells you the truth about how much her new handbag or shoes cost. I have learned this over time that in order to continue with my hobby of boat building, you have to fudge the figures a little or sometimes a lot in order to get the ok to start a new build.

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Alex,

I have been married 17 years now and I cant hide anything from that woman! She is like a forensic accountant and does all the  books as I have spent my adult life on ships around the world, its hard to take care of stuff in the middle of the ocean.  I have a  job on a drillship now with really cool stuff like phones and internet but the damage has been done- cant hide nothing! That's why I started a carpentry business, separate stream of money!  As for her telling me how much she spends.....gave up caring long ago. When I tell her about anything I want to do she automatically adds double time and money already - like I said 17 years, she knows me better than I do. 

 

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Not saying you are doing it wrong but get the kids hooked up. The minute the kiddies are onboard so to speak you go from selfish guy wasting family money to hardworking dad bonding with his kids. Most women like that. Then you take them out sailing in a boat they helped to build, their faces light up and it's all in a bag. Perfect time to tell the good wife that the 10 footer is just a tender for the real boat of your life. Whatever that might be but (usually) a lot bigger than 10 ft. PeterP

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Thank you gentlemen,

I have tried and tried to get the kids in on it, I have a 14 year old daughter which could never be bothered enough to be involved other than for some pictures for Instagram of her in it sailing on a perfect ( picture perfect) day, a 10 year old son who is far more interested in Playstation and soccer to care much, however the 4 year old baby girl is out there with me all the time. And the 10'er is absolutely a step to bigger dreams, I had rebuilt a 25' Classic Mako CC and had it for a couple years before the crash in the oil field forced me to sell it. I wanted to build the OK25, but I needed to prove that I could build a "boat" lol, I know perfectly well that the Spindrift is in a different galaxy than a OK25 but she- the wife doesnt, and she did see me finish the mako and she enjoyed being on it, so I got that going for me. 

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Years ago, my son and I built a boat “together”.  His involvement was mainly for photo the ops.  That all changed, when it was painted a pretty color and went in the water.  Keep the faith.  It’ll be different when it’s a real, fun little boat.  Just be sure to let them go out in it alone, and goof off.  Even your forensic accountant might turn the corner!

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Great topic that should probably have its own thread. I had my kids take Sunfish lessons each individually when they were 8. It was a week long camp. what I feel like they really bought in was when they realized they could sail themselves. Like me they would talk of the places they would sail to when our boat was built. Now they are older with too many things to find time to sail much. but the participation in building led them to their own creative identities. 

 

I met Amos's kids at the Messabout and saw how enthused his kids were for sailing. The key is to get them hooked young. To those that haven't read "Swallows and Amazons" to their kids, its never too late.

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One last thing on the subject.  My “boy” is now 39 years old.  The boat is in the back forty, unused, and checking badly (fir).  I thought we might give it away to someone who might get some use out of her final years.  He wants to keep her, even though he has no place to store her.  So there is some deep connection there that I will never understand.  Keep it up— you’re building more than a boat.

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Damn it, Thrillsbe you trying to get me misty eyed? I'm 39 and would do anything to have something that I did with my dad; he has been gone 4 years now. Enough said, I will not bitch about my kids ever ( in this respect anyway) again. You guys on here are awesome. 

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  • 1 month later...

Small update, super busy this time off with other carpentry projects and trying to live a "normal" family life. I managed to get the hull finial sanded and glassed. I know glassing the hull is somewhat of a question on here, but I chose to do it for these reasons: additional abrasion resistance, and I wanted to practice glass layup as it has been a while and I also wanted an excuse to try Peel Ply.  The whole process went well.....kinda ok, the starboard side was attempted when the wife was taking a nap, the 14 year old promised to look after the other two kids for long enough for me to glass just one side which turned into a completed shit show, and resulted in some shoddy work as I was trying to glass and yell at three kids who as soon as the first drop of resin hit the glass exploded into full blown civil war, woke up my wife ( nuclear civil war). The port side was accomplished at four in the morning, resulting in a smooth as a babys ass job with no dry spots. The peel ply, it was my first time using it and as advertised it doesnt like curves and I used it only on the bottom and stern, I did kinda draped it over the bow a bit where the chine ends.  If you can get it to lay down flat and with no bubbles, the finished surface is amazing, if there are bubbles in it you end up with a regular finish in that spot. So all in all it was a good experience, although I will still do a fill coat on the sides and fair it all out nice. I also through in a picture of a lattice I built for a client, 8'x8,'select cypress 1x2's which I milled, all half lap joints and no fasteners- time killer for sure, couldve been working on the boat! lol 

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Steve,

I think you should have a helper, which I did not. It would have been much easier to roll it down the hull following the glasser or another person to hold one end and lower it down on the glass in a nice even manner. I would also recommend having a clean roller pad to smooth it out and help remove any trapped bubbles. It really is pretty cool stuff, when you peel it off the surface feels like a fabric drum skin, very smooth but with a fabric texture. I would also like to pass on, when you wrap the glass over edges ( like glassing the stern) the peel ply makes the transition from the glass edge to the wood very smooth and "fair"; there is no edge to the glass, it blends it into the accompanying surface very will which I hope helps when it comes to finial sanding and fairing. BUT.....its the first time I have used it and I am far from a professional so take all that with a grain of salt. 

Hulsey 

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Steve,

 

Here are a couple of tips that we have found with peel ply.

 

Peel ply uses surface tension to hold the resin up to it's under side giving a nice slightly textures surface with all of the glass weave filled. Well in theory that is what it does. It is tempting to squeegee the heck out of the glass to keep the excess resin out of the glass. If you squeegee it too much you will end up with a zillion pin holes to fill which is much harder to fill than if you never used peel ply in the first place. You therefore need to keep the the job slightly resin rich but not so much resin that will allow the glass to float and give you a wavy surface. You need to get the peel ply on the glass before it has started to kick so that the resin be still worked. When I glassed Carlita I cut the peel ply in strips that ran across the boat so that I could get the first strip on as soon as the first 60" width of the glass was wet out. When the peel ply was worked out as well as I could get it I started wetting out the next 60" and so on.

 

As Stareed said you will need help for this job. If you find an area where there is not enough resin or it is getting too stiff to draw the resin up to the peel ply, you can add resin right on top of the peel ply and work it down and squeegee off the excess.

 

I would try doing smaller jobs until I get the feel for working with peel ply. Maybe do the rudder first and then the  centerboard if it is not already done, then the transom. Do the starboard side of the boat as one stage and then the port. 

 

Another tip is to trim off the heat cut edge of the peel ply with scissors that goes down into the resin. Epoxy sticks tenaciously to that edge and is hard to remove.  Running the peel ply in strips that run across the boat will mean that you will have lines across the boat to clean up later but if the job is too big it will get out of hand and you will have a lot more to fill and fair.

 

I am not trying to scare you but when it goes right it is wonderful. If it gets out of hand you will give yourself  lot of extra work.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I have been sitting on this ship for three weeks planning out my attack to finish her up this time home, aaaaaannnnd it going to be too cold to epoxy anything when I get there on Thursday - great! I work 1800-0600 three weeks straight so when I get home my body clock is messed up to say the least, but getting up a 3am like your late for work is great for quite work time on the boat, I guess I can still sand stuff! lol 

My epoxy should be ok right? its in the garage and Thursday night its supposed to be 28, its an attached garage and the exterior walls are insulated

 

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The epoxy will be OK once it warms up again but I would check the resin very carefully for any signs of white solid crystization in the bottom. This happens when the epoxy resin gets cold for a few days/weeks. just pull the pump out, put the cap on (I like to squeeze the jug a bit to dent it so there is no chance of it pressurizing) and throw it in the microwave for a minute at the time till it's nice and hot and all these crystals have dissolved. Then you are good to. 

 

A very common problem is that the resin pumps stop working because they suck up some unnoticed crystalline solids from the bottom of the jug. It's possible to dissasemble and flush out the pump but is a messy pain of a job. 

 

You can get a cheap foam cooler and cut holes in the top for the tops of the jugs to stick up through and get a cheap Walmart heating pad to stick in there. I got one recently for about $13 for the dog bed at the shop but they work well for keeping epoxy nice and fluid. 

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