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Fly Fisher #54


Don Silsbe

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Does anyone have experience using Kirby's paint?  It is old school enamel, so it should behave well with the roll and tip method.  (I assume.)  I am considering having Jamestown mix a custom batch of Epiphanes Two-part Poly in this shade.  The poly would be more durable, which would be the reason to pay double the price.  But the Kirby's should touch up easily.  What do y'all think?

I use Kirby's on traditional wooden boats where it goes on the wood itself, not over epoxy and such.  To say it is an old school formula is an understatement.  It is made in MA just like it was 100+ years ago.  It is the only source I know for white and red lead primers and paying.   I buy it directly from them http://www.kirbypaint.com/  It is an excellent product, but is soft. Their gloss is more of a semi-gloss by today's standards.   They will do custom colors if you send in a swatch.  They even answer their phones with real people, so call them if you want more info.

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Thanks for your input, Dave.  The gloss level doesn't bother me as much as the softness.  It'll see a fair amount of banging, loading it on & off the truck, and in and out of the garage.  Pea Green is the perfect color for my taste.  If anything, I'd be asking Jamestown Distributors to mix up some Epiphanes 2-part to that color swatch.  I'd like to use a polyurethane.  But it's going to cost me double, just to get the color I want.  

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  • 3 months later...

There's a reason my last entry was in February.  When I make a mistake, I stop for a while, and think it over.  In this case, I made three mistakes!  That required a lot of thinking over.  

 

When I worked at Chrysler Engineering, my chief engineer once said that "the trouble with us engineers is that we're butt-ugly honest".  So, with that level of honesty, I will show you all my mistakes and what I did to correct some of them.  Well, at least one of them.  Then, we can have a good discussion on what I should have done, what you would have done, etc.

 

The three mistakes are:

  1. Gaps in the inwale/breasthook joints
  2. Asymmetry in the side walls
  3. Hogback bottom (nobody has called me this name... yet)

 

Finally, I had an opportunity to review these with Graham at the Southern Appalachian Mess-about.  If you were to look in a dictionary of Southern words, under the word "candor" you would find synonyms like "rude", "ill-mannered", and "unrefined".  Fortunately, neither Graham nor I were born in the South.  After reviewing the photos, more or less he said "yeah, you're pretty-much screwed".  (He was more polite than that, though.)  I will take all these mistakes as learning opportunities, and look forward to not making them again on the next one.  (This one will be for sale in the fall.)

 

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HOGBACK UGLINESS

This is how I fixed (or mitigated the ugly) hogback bottom.  I had a similar problem when I built the Willow Kayak.  I cut the slit in the bottom about 5" longer (in the direction of the middle of the boat).  I then started removing material, to reduce the downward-jutting bow and stern.  This greatly reduced the ugliness.  There is still a little hogback in the center section of the bottom.  Oddly enough, I have the prescribed 1-1/4" of arch in the bottom.  More on that later.  But here is the process and the final result.

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QUESTION:  What went wrong?  

 

MIND THE GAP

I didn't receive a photo CD with my plans.  Not a biggie, it's a simple boat, right?  On the web somewhere, later on, I saw a photo build of a Moccasin 14.  One photo showed a similar gap & bulge at the breasthook.  There  was a comment that the builder had made this bulge/gap situation, because he installed the inwales before the gunwales.  So did I!!!  Oh well.  Live and learn.

 

ASYMMETRY 

If you look back on page 1 of this topic, you will see that I added a piece of wood to each side, to fix a gap problem.  I believe that these additions are the cause of my hogback issue.  But also, maybe, one side "wanted" to be fixed less than the other.  Another cause could be my installing the inwales first, causing undue forces more on one side than the other.  

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I've been busy with this project, trying to get it done before I need it (in mid-July).  I taped the hull, and worked on floatation chambers for both ends.  I also cut out patterns for the seat, and formed the seat back.  This morning, I put them all (floatation chambers, seat back and patterns) in place for the photos below.  Now, the whole thing will lay dormant for a week, while we go off and conquer Charleston, SC & environs.

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  • 5 weeks later...

I launched her on Saturday, when we had some friends visiting.  She looks pretty good, despite her "warts"!  And she handles well.  I can't wait to do some fishing out of her.  The Kirby paint definitely gets banged up, but I love the color.

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