Daggerboard Hum Loud!

19.57 in Boat Plans, daggerboard, hum, loud

Sometimes when dinghies go fast they sing to you, as is the case in this video of a 14 Javelin class at speed on a long spinnaker reach. Originally designed by John Spencer of New Zealand as a follow-on to his 12 Cherub, the Javelin is a development skiff design, single trapeze with a moderate rig. The Javelin remains an Antipodean class, raced in Australia and New Zealand.

Yee-Ha!

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Daggerboard trunk

14.01 in Boat Plans, daggerboard, trunk

Tonight I only had time to assemble the daggerboard trunk. A quick sanding on the edges smoothed the mating surfaces for the spacers. Then I mixed up some unthickened epoxy and gave the interior surfaces another coat to fill the weave of the fiberglass. The remaining epoxy I thickened with Cabosil, and spread it on the mating surfaces of both panels. The spacers were put in place, and sandwiched between the panels. It was surprisingly difficult to align everything when the clamps were put on. All the pieces slipped and slided, until the majority of epoxy was finally squeezed out. I then gave the parts one more alignment, shifting clamps as I went. After I brushed off most of the excess epoxy, I brought the part in the house to cure in the warmer air. Total time 51.25.

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Daggerboard bottom slot

16.02 in Boat Plans, bottom, daggerboard, slot

With the interior bulkheads in place, the instructions call for the hull to be flipped over, and epoxy coated as the interior was. However, in the instructions, the daggerboard trunk bottom slot is to be cut at a later time. I reasoned that since this would expose some bare wood that would need to be epoxy coated, I would go ahead and cut the bottom slot early. This would allow the edges of the bottom panel to be epoxy coated in the same process as the whole hull.

Cutting the slot brought me back to my old nemesis, the router. Im not sure why this tool intimidates me so much. I guess it is my inexperience with it, and the thought that irreparable damage to the project could be done so quickly if it were to get out of control. But with a 1/2" flush-cut bit newly purchased last night, I set to work. And I neednt have been so worried. I drilled two 1/2" pilot holes to enlarge the tiny marker holes I had drilled from the inside just before installing the daggerboard trunk. So I had no fear of missing the interior chamber of the DB trunk. I then turned on the router with its new bit, and was amazed how quickly and smoothly it removed material to create a clean, neat slot in the bottom panel, perfectly even with the interior surface of the DB trunk. There was one tiny irregularity in the edge, where the bits guide bearing rode over a glob of epoxy that had squeezed out of the bottom DB trunk joint. That was quite unavoidable, and easily fixed with a rasp.

So now I have a long afternoon ahead of me, sanding the lapstrake joints and filled stitch holes ahead of epoxy coating the exterior hull. Total hours 58.10.

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