Coastal rowing boat

Over the last few weeks I have made repairs to a plywood coastal rowing boat. It is well used and the bow and rudder were damaged, a wooden outrigger was broken and the bilge pump had ripped its mounting block from the bulkhead. Further work is needed to epoxy/glass tape along the full length internally.

 

The bow damage was caused by rubbing against the trailer and being beached. Both ends of the boat had splits between the hull and deck allowing the bouyancy chambers to fill up with water. The old glass tape was sanded off and replaced with a couple of layers of epoxy/glass. This was sanded smooth and epoxy primed ready for the club to repaint the whole boat at a later stage. A similar process was used for the other repairs.


The cracked outrigger had been held on with a strip of aluminum screwed into 4mm ply. This was removed and the broken grp ground off. The crack was dried and filled with thickened epoxy. This and the surrounding area was relaminated, stepped down to one layer at the edge. All this was sanded smooth and epoxy filled and faired, then primed.

The finished repair

Swift rowing boats

I've had several repairs to complete on the local club rowing boats this year. The racing shells are tricky to work on and have epoxy/kevlar/carbon hulls. On these boats I have done a repair to a delaminated area of coremat in the hull skin, a rudder tube that had broken out at the deck end and a fin box repair. The hull had distorted around the site of a previous repair to the fin box at the stern. It seems that the fin had been caught on something and had ripped the fin box out. Someone had bonded it back in slightly proud of the hull and the aluminium had corroded, expanded and distorted the area around it forming a bulge, like a snake swallowing an egg.

Distorted hull area

The hull did not return to its previous shape when the fin box was removed so I cut the whole section out and  moulded up a repair patch from epoxy/glass with carbon strands laid along the keel line. This was then bonded in on both sides, epoxy filled and faired. This was not straightforward as I only had access to the outside.

The finished repair

A new fin box and fin were bonded in and then the repair was primed and spray painted in 2 pack automotive paint.

14' Strip plank canoe

The cedar canoe is now taking shape. Any spare time has been devoted to it to keep it progressing before the weather turns truly cold. Fitting the strips went really smoothly, with the final closing strips going in without drama. There is a lot of force required to bend them into place which can break the fragile cove on the strips. After many hours taking the edges off the strips with a block plane and spoke shave it was time to start boarding the hull with sandpaper.

When all the sanding was done I took a spare cedar strip and spring clamped it to the hull to form a smooth curve to cut the sheer line. I used a Japanese saw to follow the curve. This is a nice point in the project to open the workshop and look at what now appears very canoe like.

I am now looking to get the workspace as warm and dry as possible to avoid any issues with the epoxy and fibreglass sheathing.

www.newtonboatworks.co.uk