The Slow Saga of Zip Frame #4 — part three

The long holiday weekend proved to be fruitful in my cramped little boat shop. After a little sanding, I started drawing out some frame gussets. Next thing you know, I had 3/4 of the frame assembled.

Floor beam, after sanding the laminated strips to shape.

Floor beam and one of the side pieces.

Drawing out frame gussets on scrap pieces of plywood.

Next thing you know, the gussets were cut, sanded, and screwed onto the frame.

Starboard side detail.

Port side detail.

The Slow Saga of Zip Frame #4 — part two

Happy Thanksgiving!

With the basic sanding done, and the keel notch widened, I next laid the floor beam on top of my full-size construction drawing in order to check the shape.

Floor beam on the construction drawing.

The good news is, that one side of the floor beam was a darn-near perfect match with the drawing from the plans. Unfortunately, however, the other side was not. It had been over-cut, and as a result was not wide (or tall) enough in the outer section of the curve.

Here you can see the gap between the actual floor beam, and the line where it should be.

So, I decided to remedy the situation by laminating on a thin strip of wood. Fortunately, I had a scrap piece of mahogany that was almost exactly the same width as the floor beam. I used my little Rockwell BladeRunner to cut a couple of strips approximately 3/16" thick.

Cutting a couple of thin strips of mahogany.

I clamped the strips into place to see how they fit. It was a relief to see that this was going to be an apparently easy thing to do.

Test-fitting the strips.

So, this morning, I removed the clamps and prepped my work area with a sheet of waxed paper.

I gathered all the items I'd need: Scale, mixing cup, scraper, chip brush, mixing stick, rag, epoxy, and of course... my bag of mahogany wood dust.

The rest was easy and straightforward. I mixed a small batch of epoxy & thickened it with wood dust. I brushed it onto both mating surfaces, clamped it all down, and scraped away as much squeeze-out as I could. In a few more hours, it should be nice and solid.

A little epoxy, and a lot of clamps. Now, just to wait for the epoxy to cure.

Thanks for reading... and good luck with Black Friday tomorrow.

"in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you."     

— Thessalonians 5:18 

The Slow Saga of Zip Frame #4 — part one

Frame #4 on the Glen-L Zip is the location of the boat's dash board (steering wheel, gauges, etc).

The dashboard beam at Frame #4 is customizable to whatever shape or arrangement you please. This Glen-L Zip has the optional walk-through bridge deck. And, as you can see, a classic Mercury motor.

Progress on my Frame #4 has been moving at a snail's pace... but I am making progress. For most of the month, it has been daily (if brief) sessions of hand-sanding the frame components at 5:00 am with my morning coffee.

That would be three out of the four frame components. I actually ran out of enough length of the $94 mahogany board I bought back in May, so I have not yet cut the actual dashboard beam.

Another example of a dashboard on a Glen-L Zip, and this builder's interpretation with the multi-colored overlay of woods.

Here's yet another example of a dashboard on a Glen-L Zip. This photo also shows it more in context with the rest of Frame #4.

Floor beam for Frame #4. The side beams can be seen in the foreground.

Most of the work this month has been hand-sanding the rough-cut mahogany parts from this:

Rough-cut mahogany as I bought it at the lumber yard.

Into a smooth surface like this: 

Sanded mahogany side beams for Frame #4.

In the process of sanding, I have continued to save the mahogany wood dust for future use as a thickening agent for epoxy.

The paltry amount of wood dust I'd collected a month ago.

Now I have about 3X that amount, just from working on Frame #4 — so far.

After all the sanding, I found that I needed to widen the keel notch in order to accommodate the 4" keel. It's not perfectly symmetrical, but it's within acceptable tolerances for me.

So, there you have it for Frame #4 progress so far. It's slow progress, but then again I'm in no major hurry. Until I figure out where I'm gonna put the other boat, I don't have room to set up the Zip construction, anyway.

But, I'll get there.

"— being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it"     

Phillipians 1:6