I can't resist - here is another post. This time of the finished product - waiting for spring, and in the water!
Thursday, April 28, 2016
I can't resist - here is another post. This time of the finished product - waiting for spring, and in the water!
Saturday, February 27, 2016
Finishing Touches
Finally down to the end. After a year and 4 months, I'm calling it done. There is one glaring omission - I did not re-finish the sponsons. They will have to wait for another effort.
The final bits were to re-finish the thwarts, re-furbish the front seat, and build a new back seat. In addition to building the seats, I also decided to brand the back seat with the OLD TOWN logo, OTCA 1945, and my signature. This was done using a logo downloaded from the net, and scanner, and a laser etcher! The etching came out quite nicely if I do say so myself. Then, gluing up the dowel joints, 4 coats of varnish, and weaving some 1" webbing, and voila personalized seats!
And Finally, install the seats and thwarts...
Some final pics...
Well, that about does it. Perhaps some outdoor pics in the spring when the weather is nicer!
The final bits were to re-finish the thwarts, re-furbish the front seat, and build a new back seat. In addition to building the seats, I also decided to brand the back seat with the OLD TOWN logo, OTCA 1945, and my signature. This was done using a logo downloaded from the net, and scanner, and a laser etcher! The etching came out quite nicely if I do say so myself. Then, gluing up the dowel joints, 4 coats of varnish, and weaving some 1" webbing, and voila personalized seats!
And Finally, install the seats and thwarts...
Some final pics...
Well, that about does it. Perhaps some outdoor pics in the spring when the weather is nicer!
Sunday, January 31, 2016
Well, we're getting to the end game now. I installed the stem bands. Major learning there is that the friction in new pre-drilled ash of a 3/4" long number 4 brass screw is about equal to the shear strength of the shaft. After shearing off a couple of screws installing the stem band, I went to the hardware store and got about 20 5/8" screws. These did not seem to shear off. Other than shearing off screws, the stem bands went on without a hitch.
Overall, the stem bands clean up the bow and stern quite nicely.
All that remains is to make a couple of seats, and re-finish the thwarts. All that is salvageable from the old bow seat is the two cross-pieces. I got a friend to cut a maple 1" board into 1.5" strips. The front seat cross pieces are about 7" and the back seat about 8" (the front seat dimensions are from the old cross-pieces, and the rear inferred from the spacing of the holes for the mounting bolts in the inner gunnel). Luckily, I the seat spacers were with the canoe, along with all but one of the diamond head bolts, so getting the seats installed at the right height should not be a problem.
The seat pieces are assembled using dowel joints, 2 dowels in the end of each cross-piece. The same friend loaned me a doweling jig and 3/8" piloted drill. Very cool piece of equipment that works like a charm - all the holes align and the seats assemble nicely. The maple is quite white, so I put a bit of the minwax early american stain to darken them a bit. Now some glue, varnish and webbing and the last bits should be done. I think I'll go with red webbing to match design #4.
I'm also in the process of stripping the thwarts so I can varnish all these last bits at the same time. Actually, I am using a scraper to remove the old varnish, and then rough sanding. Scrapers are cool.
I'll try to post some pics when the seats are complete and installed. Other than that, I think we are nearing the end of this blog. Tasks that remain, but may not be done are restoring the sponsons and paining yellow inside the blue up triangles in the sponson version of design #4. I am not a big fan of sponsons, so no sure if/when I'll get to those. I also like the red and blue version of design #4, so am not inclined to rush into that either.
Until next time...
Overall, the stem bands clean up the bow and stern quite nicely.
All that remains is to make a couple of seats, and re-finish the thwarts. All that is salvageable from the old bow seat is the two cross-pieces. I got a friend to cut a maple 1" board into 1.5" strips. The front seat cross pieces are about 7" and the back seat about 8" (the front seat dimensions are from the old cross-pieces, and the rear inferred from the spacing of the holes for the mounting bolts in the inner gunnel). Luckily, I the seat spacers were with the canoe, along with all but one of the diamond head bolts, so getting the seats installed at the right height should not be a problem.
The seat pieces are assembled using dowel joints, 2 dowels in the end of each cross-piece. The same friend loaned me a doweling jig and 3/8" piloted drill. Very cool piece of equipment that works like a charm - all the holes align and the seats assemble nicely. The maple is quite white, so I put a bit of the minwax early american stain to darken them a bit. Now some glue, varnish and webbing and the last bits should be done. I think I'll go with red webbing to match design #4.
I'm also in the process of stripping the thwarts so I can varnish all these last bits at the same time. Actually, I am using a scraper to remove the old varnish, and then rough sanding. Scrapers are cool.
I'll try to post some pics when the seats are complete and installed. Other than that, I think we are nearing the end of this blog. Tasks that remain, but may not be done are restoring the sponsons and paining yellow inside the blue up triangles in the sponson version of design #4. I am not a big fan of sponsons, so no sure if/when I'll get to those. I also like the red and blue version of design #4, so am not inclined to rush into that either.
Until next time...
Sunday, January 10, 2016
I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas and are now into a happy new year! Quite a bit accomplished since the last report where we had the canvas on, filled and primed, and the outer gunnels installed. Since then, despite a few distractions over the holidays, we have come to the final stages. The keel is installed, the bottom painted, and Old Town Design #4 painted on. A few details if I can remember them...
When lining up the keel, and looking at the stem bands, I decided the stem band needed to end up flush with the bottom of the keel. I carved out the keel up to about where the inside stem ends, and rounded the ends to hopefully give a nice, flush seam when the stem band is installed. I left the ends of the tapered ends full thickness. (this pic after paint, It is not too good, but I forgot to take a picture before).
I pre-drilled for the keel screws, through the dacron for the existing ribs with existing holes for the keel screws, and through the rib, planking and dacron for the replaced ribs. I took some care with drilling through the dacron as it stretched to much if I tried to just drill through. So, I built up some blocks to flush with the bottom of the canoe (right side up) and then could easily drill through the dacron with no stretching or pulls. I then lined up the keel centered fore/aft, marked where all the keel screws would come through and pre-drilled on the keel centerline. I also tried pre-drilling the tapered ends of the keel - mistake - they are too thin, and I ended up not being able to pull them down flush anyway. (The current plan is to paint and then later try to pull the ends (more) flush when I install the stem bands. It will likely mean some caulking of these ends after installation (and paint).)
I did not like the cone washers Island Falls sent as they would require more counter-sinking of the ribs than I was comfortable with. So, I got some brass finish washers at the hardware store instead. They looked like they would not end up flush, but the size pretty well matched the marks in the ribs from the original keel installation.
(recall at this point there was a 50-50 diluted varnish coat on the concave, soon to be hidden side of the keel.) I put a bead of the fancy 3M 5200 caulking on the concave side of the keel and with the canoe upside down managed to get the fore and aft most screws into the pilot holes. Then, starting at the front (with the canoe still upside down, I got a few other screws started from the bottom. But, it was hard to get the screws in to the pilot holes. I turned the canoe back right side up, and started installing the screws fore to aft (but with a few started in the middle of the canoe as well). Overall, I got about half of the screws to align with the pilot holes, and had to re-drill the keel for the others. Before installing each screw, I dipped it in the caulking compound to hopefully get a good seal around the dacron in case any water gets under the keel. I note that very little caulking came out from under the keel, so I probably did not use quite enough and there may be some air gaps. But, the screws pulled up to the dacron quite nicely as I tightened the screws. And, the finish washers distorted as I tightened the screws making them quite more flush and smooth than I was expecting. The inside looks quite nice with the screws and finish washers snugged up and the slots aligned fore-aft.
Next, on to painting. The Interlux Hatteras off white is a bit yellower than I expected, but looks fine. The paint went on fine, I used 3 coats, and used a bit over 3/4 of the (quart?) can. I used a 2" brush with fore-aft strokes on all coats. The finish coat is quite nice although you can still see the planking irregularities through the dacron (as expected). Before painting, I put standard masking tape on the new gunnels. (This turned out to be sub-optimal as the white (especially, but also the blue and red) bled under it a bit, and made it hard to remove later on. Overall not too bad, and on the bottom, but it is probably worth using the better masking tape for this as well. However, this would have likely put me over the one roll of tape I bought.)
I'll also note at this point that if you sight down the keel, you can see a bulge where the 6 adjacent new ribs are installed forward of the center gunnel. My trick of using a false keel when setting the new ribs seems to have worked well in the stern section, but was not quite up to keeping the large number of adjacent ribs flush. I am not what I would try next time. Perhaps a longer, stiffer false keel where there are many adjacent ribs. (rather than moving the shorter one as I did)
And, on to Old Town Design #4. I measured the triangles on the old sponsons that I am trying to match (see earlier post). The down triangles are 3" tall. 3/4" between up and down triangles. A bit over 7" base at the gunnel. The total length is 208". To get red in the center, and at both ends at the tip, I chose to use 29 down triangles. I cut a 'standard' triangle out of heavy paper (a manila folder) that was 3" tall, and 7 3/16" base. Centering the first on on the center thwart, I marked 5 1/2 widths on the gunnel tape, and also marked 5 locations (7 3/16 apart) from the bow and stern. To make sure to put any mismatch in an un-noticeable spot, I marked the last 4 by measuring from the existing marks, bisecting and then re-bisecting the remaining gap. With the ends of the triangles marked on the gunnel tape, I just lined up the template triangle, and marked the tip of the large triangles with eraseable crayons (drawing a line up the top of each side of the triangle to the tip). I also used the template and the crayons to mark the large triangles around the bow and stern. There is no need to mark the small triangles as they are formed using the masking tape.
With all the triangles marked, it is on to the masking tape. First, I connected all the crosses parallel to the gunnel - this forms the base of the small triangles. Then I cut tape for the sides of the triangles. Note I cut the ends of the tape at an angle so that the tape would not over-hang into the adjacent triangle. But, the angle should not be less than half the angle between the triangles as you do not want a gap between the tape (an over-lap seems to work out fine. Once I got started, I started crimping the ends of the tape far from the gunnels to make it easier to remove at after paining. At the tip of the canoe, there is no room for the smaller triangle. At least one photo I have shows a diamond there instead. So, after taping, I cut out a triangle that matched one end of the diamond, then flipped it over the short end to mark the other half of the diamond, and taped that as well. This all took some time and patience, but really went rather smoothly. The tape is light green, so not very visible in the photo.
And on to painting. Red and blue. 3 coats each. What happened to black you ask? The photos I have show red and blue down triangles, and blue up triangles. Rather than introducing yet another color, I decided that yellow up triangles, boardered by blue would be close enough. And soon (after seeing the pictures) you may ask - what happened to the yellow. For now, I think red and blue down, and blue up may be more 'original' and will stick with that for now. I may add the yellow later by masking off the edge of each of the blue up triangles. Hopefully, the blue will be cured well enough to not get peeled off when removing the tape. But for now, I'm sticking with red and blue - very patriotic don't you think? Oh, and maybe add the 'star' design on the bow???
So, here is after painting, but before removing the tape:
while removing the tape:
So, now it is on to varnishing the gunnels (remember, I only did the insides before, the gunnels still need 3-4 coats of varnish... ugh. Then, install the stem bands. Then all that remains is to refinish the thwarts and do something about seats...
More supplies:
brass finish washers - 25@.45ea Katz Ace 11.25
marine sealant (3M 5200) Home Depot 18.58
foam paint brushes Katz Ace 1.29
3M fineline 218 tape (3/4" x 60 yd) NHBragg 12.75 + shipping 20.10
Paint 1/2 pint: red, blue, black, yellow 4x5.99 35.96
paint brushes 4 38.00
When lining up the keel, and looking at the stem bands, I decided the stem band needed to end up flush with the bottom of the keel. I carved out the keel up to about where the inside stem ends, and rounded the ends to hopefully give a nice, flush seam when the stem band is installed. I left the ends of the tapered ends full thickness. (this pic after paint, It is not too good, but I forgot to take a picture before).
I pre-drilled for the keel screws, through the dacron for the existing ribs with existing holes for the keel screws, and through the rib, planking and dacron for the replaced ribs. I took some care with drilling through the dacron as it stretched to much if I tried to just drill through. So, I built up some blocks to flush with the bottom of the canoe (right side up) and then could easily drill through the dacron with no stretching or pulls. I then lined up the keel centered fore/aft, marked where all the keel screws would come through and pre-drilled on the keel centerline. I also tried pre-drilling the tapered ends of the keel - mistake - they are too thin, and I ended up not being able to pull them down flush anyway. (The current plan is to paint and then later try to pull the ends (more) flush when I install the stem bands. It will likely mean some caulking of these ends after installation (and paint).)
I did not like the cone washers Island Falls sent as they would require more counter-sinking of the ribs than I was comfortable with. So, I got some brass finish washers at the hardware store instead. They looked like they would not end up flush, but the size pretty well matched the marks in the ribs from the original keel installation.
(recall at this point there was a 50-50 diluted varnish coat on the concave, soon to be hidden side of the keel.) I put a bead of the fancy 3M 5200 caulking on the concave side of the keel and with the canoe upside down managed to get the fore and aft most screws into the pilot holes. Then, starting at the front (with the canoe still upside down, I got a few other screws started from the bottom. But, it was hard to get the screws in to the pilot holes. I turned the canoe back right side up, and started installing the screws fore to aft (but with a few started in the middle of the canoe as well). Overall, I got about half of the screws to align with the pilot holes, and had to re-drill the keel for the others. Before installing each screw, I dipped it in the caulking compound to hopefully get a good seal around the dacron in case any water gets under the keel. I note that very little caulking came out from under the keel, so I probably did not use quite enough and there may be some air gaps. But, the screws pulled up to the dacron quite nicely as I tightened the screws. And, the finish washers distorted as I tightened the screws making them quite more flush and smooth than I was expecting. The inside looks quite nice with the screws and finish washers snugged up and the slots aligned fore-aft.
Next, on to painting. The Interlux Hatteras off white is a bit yellower than I expected, but looks fine. The paint went on fine, I used 3 coats, and used a bit over 3/4 of the (quart?) can. I used a 2" brush with fore-aft strokes on all coats. The finish coat is quite nice although you can still see the planking irregularities through the dacron (as expected). Before painting, I put standard masking tape on the new gunnels. (This turned out to be sub-optimal as the white (especially, but also the blue and red) bled under it a bit, and made it hard to remove later on. Overall not too bad, and on the bottom, but it is probably worth using the better masking tape for this as well. However, this would have likely put me over the one roll of tape I bought.)
I'll also note at this point that if you sight down the keel, you can see a bulge where the 6 adjacent new ribs are installed forward of the center gunnel. My trick of using a false keel when setting the new ribs seems to have worked well in the stern section, but was not quite up to keeping the large number of adjacent ribs flush. I am not what I would try next time. Perhaps a longer, stiffer false keel where there are many adjacent ribs. (rather than moving the shorter one as I did)
And, on to Old Town Design #4. I measured the triangles on the old sponsons that I am trying to match (see earlier post). The down triangles are 3" tall. 3/4" between up and down triangles. A bit over 7" base at the gunnel. The total length is 208". To get red in the center, and at both ends at the tip, I chose to use 29 down triangles. I cut a 'standard' triangle out of heavy paper (a manila folder) that was 3" tall, and 7 3/16" base. Centering the first on on the center thwart, I marked 5 1/2 widths on the gunnel tape, and also marked 5 locations (7 3/16 apart) from the bow and stern. To make sure to put any mismatch in an un-noticeable spot, I marked the last 4 by measuring from the existing marks, bisecting and then re-bisecting the remaining gap. With the ends of the triangles marked on the gunnel tape, I just lined up the template triangle, and marked the tip of the large triangles with eraseable crayons (drawing a line up the top of each side of the triangle to the tip). I also used the template and the crayons to mark the large triangles around the bow and stern. There is no need to mark the small triangles as they are formed using the masking tape.
With all the triangles marked, it is on to the masking tape. First, I connected all the crosses parallel to the gunnel - this forms the base of the small triangles. Then I cut tape for the sides of the triangles. Note I cut the ends of the tape at an angle so that the tape would not over-hang into the adjacent triangle. But, the angle should not be less than half the angle between the triangles as you do not want a gap between the tape (an over-lap seems to work out fine. Once I got started, I started crimping the ends of the tape far from the gunnels to make it easier to remove at after paining. At the tip of the canoe, there is no room for the smaller triangle. At least one photo I have shows a diamond there instead. So, after taping, I cut out a triangle that matched one end of the diamond, then flipped it over the short end to mark the other half of the diamond, and taped that as well. This all took some time and patience, but really went rather smoothly. The tape is light green, so not very visible in the photo.
And on to painting. Red and blue. 3 coats each. What happened to black you ask? The photos I have show red and blue down triangles, and blue up triangles. Rather than introducing yet another color, I decided that yellow up triangles, boardered by blue would be close enough. And soon (after seeing the pictures) you may ask - what happened to the yellow. For now, I think red and blue down, and blue up may be more 'original' and will stick with that for now. I may add the yellow later by masking off the edge of each of the blue up triangles. Hopefully, the blue will be cured well enough to not get peeled off when removing the tape. But for now, I'm sticking with red and blue - very patriotic don't you think? Oh, and maybe add the 'star' design on the bow???
So, here is after painting, but before removing the tape:
while removing the tape:
And, drum roll please - ta da...
So, now it is on to varnishing the gunnels (remember, I only did the insides before, the gunnels still need 3-4 coats of varnish... ugh. Then, install the stem bands. Then all that remains is to refinish the thwarts and do something about seats...
More supplies:
brass finish washers - 25@.45ea Katz Ace 11.25
marine sealant (3M 5200) Home Depot 18.58
foam paint brushes Katz Ace 1.29
3M fineline 218 tape (3/4" x 60 yd) NHBragg 12.75 + shipping 20.10
Paint 1/2 pint: red, blue, black, yellow 4x5.99 35.96
paint brushes 4 38.00
Friday, December 18, 2015
I've been busy lately. Continuing from the last post, I put on 4 coats of primer. After the first coat with a foam brush, I switched to a 2" brush for the remaining 3, alternating up/down and fore/aft strokes. The primer went on much thicker with the brush, and the weave is finally filled, and the color pretty uniform. (Looks like I forgot to get a pic with just the primer done - here is one with one gunnel mounted and the other clamped.)
This all went fine, right up to the ends where the canoe curls up quite a bit. It is certainly nice that Island Falls pre-bent the ends of the gunnels - I'm not sure it could be done if they were not. Even with the pre-bending, it was hard to the curve of the new gunnel to align with the deck and ribs. I got as close as I could, and then it came down to sanding and a bit of leveling with a chisel to touch things up after I got the ends rounded.
After priming, time to put the keel on. I unwrapped the keel and gunnels I picked up from Island Falls Canoe last spring. The keel screws will need to go through the canvas and I was worried about pulling the dacron. So, I positioned the canoe right side up, put blocks underneath to just flush with the bottom, under a rib, and drilled through the dacron using the existing screw holes as guides. For the new ribs, I again blocked and drilled through so they are ready also. No problem drilling through with a backing - without the backing the dacron was stretching in an uncomfortable way...
I'll note here that Island Falls sent v-washers to protect the ribs from the keel screws. These were finishing washers originally (you can tell from the size of the indentations) and I went out and got some of these to use instead. I do not like the idea of countersinking the ribs as much as would be required without the finish washers. Of course, these will be a bit proud, but the original indentations are a bit deep, so I'll see how far I can sink them when I install the keel.
The stem bands also came in the mean time. I decided to carve out the tapered portion of the keel so the stem band ends flush with the bottom of the keel (once they get mounted). Then I positioned the keel evenly fore/aft, and centered and held it on with straps, got under the canoe and tapped a punch through each rib to mark where I need to pre-drill for the screws.
I put a coat of 50-50 thinned varnish on the sides of the keel and gunnels that will be hidden to protect them from the elements -hopefully.
Then, for unknown reasons (or perhaps just because I did not have the proper caulking yet), I decided to mount the outer gunnels. It is a bit of a chore getting them flush with the already installed ribs, but a bit of adjusting, and moving from the center to the ends, and it went pretty well at least to the curved ends of the canoe. For each screw, I positioned and clamped the gunnel, aligning to be as flush as I could with the rib. Then every other rib (odd ribs, starting at the center thwart rib) I used a punch to position the hole, drilled just through the gunnel with a large drill, drilled through the rib and into the inner gunnel with a smaller drill, countersunk drilled to get the head just below flush, and then put in the 1.5"x8 slotted screw (leaving the slot parallel to the gunnel of course). Interestingly, or perhaps naturally, I managed to hit the old holes on the inner gunnels most of the time. This all took a much larger toll on my forearms than expected, They are still a bit sore...
This all went fine, right up to the ends where the canoe curls up quite a bit. It is certainly nice that Island Falls pre-bent the ends of the gunnels - I'm not sure it could be done if they were not. Even with the pre-bending, it was hard to the curve of the new gunnel to align with the deck and ribs. I got as close as I could, and then it came down to sanding and a bit of leveling with a chisel to touch things up after I got the ends rounded.
After getting to the ends, I was left with a bit of a mess to close out. Clamping across the boat I could get the two sides close, and got screws into the last rib on each side. The thickness of the stem and planking turns out to be wider than the stem band, so the gunnel cut-out does not close at the bow and stern. I wound up cutting the gunnels to roughly parallel to the curve of the bow, and hand carved some of the rib white cedar to fill the gap, hopefully enough for the stem band to cover. Then some sawing off of corners, planing and a lot of sanding to get a rounded shape on both ends. I think the stem bands should cover this reasonably well, at least good enough for me!
Then some sanding of the new wood, and leveling at the ends to bring the gunnels down to the ribs where needed, and a coat of 50-50 thinned varnish to seal, and voila.
I noticed in prying the ends of the gunnels around, a 'sag' appeared in the dacron at the bow on the port side. I am not sure why it came, but ironing (at 5.5 setting) seemed to take it right out, even with the filler and primer. So far, the dacron remains nice and tight otherwise.
I think that covers most of the latest activities. Now it is on to installing the keel. I got the special 3M 5200 caulking to hopefully keep leaks from the keel screws (and then the stem bands when I get to them). Then on to touching up the primer and painting the hull.
Quite a few more supplies this period...(I'm not sure what has been reported before, but here is a list that goes back a bit...)
Stewart Systems
1 qt Dacron filler (Ekofill) 48.00
dacron cloth 15/ydX7 yds 105.00
Dacron glue (not used) 12.00
Katz Hardware
Primer (Zinzer 123) 1 qt 12.00
3" foam brushes (2) 3.00
Island Falls Canoe
25 Keel washers (wrong ones) 6.25
25 1"x8 screws (keel) 6.25
30 oval head 3/4"x4 screws (stem bands) 6.00
100 1.5"x8 screws (gunnels) 19.00
2 stem bands 50.00
1 Qt Hatteras Off white - Interlux Premium Yacht Enamel 45.00
shipping 34.00
Katz Hartdware
25 brass finish washers (#8) 11.25
2" foam brush 1.29
Home Depot
3m 5200 Marine Sealant 100oz 18.50
NHBragg
3m fine line 218 3/4"x60yds masking tape 20.10 (12.75 + shipping)
Sunday, November 29, 2015
The day after Thanksgiving, and time for another post. (Well, now it is Sunday after Thanksgiving. Per usual, a few interruptions as life keeps intruding on important stuff like wasting time on an illogical project like this. So, back to updating this post...) Despite too much turkey, and many relatives come a visitin' I have done a bit of 'work' since the last post.
The 3.7oz dacron from Stewart systems turns out to be a finer weave than the 'heavy' dacron (2.9 oz) from Aircraft Spruce I used for the kayak. It was a bit coarser weave than the lightweight dacron I used for the deck of the Pocock scull.
I applied the Dacron, mostly using the Heat-n-bond rather than the liquid glue from Stewart systems. The tape is easy to apply, goes on uniformly, is easy to iron and tell when it is penetrated, and overall just seems easier. With the glue on the planking around the gunnels, I went back an 'calibrated' the iron. I put tape with numbers and a tick mark to be a bit more precise in the settings. I then took a 4x3 inch piece of cloth and progressively ironed at increasing settings. The results were:
Setting length width
0 4 3
3 3 7/8 2 15/16
4 3 3/4 2 13/16 (glue irons to cedar)
4.5 (wool) 3 3/4 2 13/16
5 3 9/16 2 5/8
5.5 (cotton) 3 1/2 2 9/16
6 3 1/4 2 7/16
6.5 (max) 3 3/16 2 6/16
(Note that this was with a newish 'modern' iron, and I could not melt the dacron even at the highest setting. I did a trial with an OLD electric iron, and managed to completely melt the dacron, before it was even on high...)
Before putting on the dacron, I covered the planking with 'saran wrap'. (Actually, I used some clear plastic on a roll that is used for packing stuff.) I held this on with double sided tape on the corners. This is to keep the dacron from being 'glued' to the planking when painting on the filler. In the figures, you can see the plastic sheeting, and the heat-n-bond ironed to the top of the planking. The heat-n-bond was set using a setting of 4 on the iron.
I could pull the dacron quite tight while activating the glue with the iron, and ended up with a pretty good job just doing that. You can tell when the glue is well set as the dacron goes clear when the glue saturates the weave.
Worked from the center to the ends. At the ends, I cut the dacron close to length, and split up the center to where the bow (stern) 'breaks'. Turns out, I should have pulled to the gunnels further before splitting to make a neater and shorter split. I could pull tight almost to the end of the gunnels before splitting. Then I used 7/8" heat-n-bond, even with one side of the stem and overlapping the other side. I pulled the dacron over from the 'even' side and ironed on the stem and around to the overlapping side, but not to the edge of the glue. I used scissors to trim even with the edge of the glue, and then ironed that side to get good glue saturation. Then I put another layer of glue (7/8" heat-n-bond) over the first layer - that is, even with the same side as before, so now around the edge on the near side. Then I could iron on the dacron to the near side of the canoe, and trim the dacron even with the far edge of the stem. Hopefully, the outer edge will now be under (or just sticking out of the stem band - whenever I get to that...). I note that the under layer overlap on the one side is not visible.
At this point the dacron actually looked pretty tight. But, I ironed anyway at a setting of 4.5 from the keel down to the gunnels. Need to move the iron quite slowly to get the dacron to shrink fully to this setting. Again, looked quite tight, but being brave, I reset the iron to 5.5 and ironed again. This seems quite tight, and I decided to forego ironing at the highest setting. Note that for all this I tried to avoid ironing over any of the glue to keep it from letting go.
And on to filling the dacron. I went with Ekofill from Stewart Systems. Much thinner than I expected (not knowing what to expect). I only bought a quart figuring I would get at least 2 coats and that would be marginally enough. Well, I got 6 coats, and still have a bit left in the bottom of the can. I put it all on with a 3" foam brush, right from the can. First, up/down brush strokes, then lengthwise strokes alternating between coats. After the first coat is was quite splotchy, which you probably cannot see in the top 2 photos, but after the that, the color was nice and even. It took about 1.5 hours to paint on each coat. There was one soft area in the canvas at the tip of the bow that I noticed after the 3rd coat. Surprisingly, ironing at 5.5 took it right out. The only soft areas now are at the glued areas, not too bad, and should be under the gunnel.
The 3.7oz dacron from Stewart systems turns out to be a finer weave than the 'heavy' dacron (2.9 oz) from Aircraft Spruce I used for the kayak. It was a bit coarser weave than the lightweight dacron I used for the deck of the Pocock scull.
I applied the Dacron, mostly using the Heat-n-bond rather than the liquid glue from Stewart systems. The tape is easy to apply, goes on uniformly, is easy to iron and tell when it is penetrated, and overall just seems easier. With the glue on the planking around the gunnels, I went back an 'calibrated' the iron. I put tape with numbers and a tick mark to be a bit more precise in the settings. I then took a 4x3 inch piece of cloth and progressively ironed at increasing settings. The results were:
Setting length width
0 4 3
3 3 7/8 2 15/16
4 3 3/4 2 13/16 (glue irons to cedar)
4.5 (wool) 3 3/4 2 13/16
5 3 9/16 2 5/8
5.5 (cotton) 3 1/2 2 9/16
6 3 1/4 2 7/16
6.5 (max) 3 3/16 2 6/16
(Note that this was with a newish 'modern' iron, and I could not melt the dacron even at the highest setting. I did a trial with an OLD electric iron, and managed to completely melt the dacron, before it was even on high...)
Before putting on the dacron, I covered the planking with 'saran wrap'. (Actually, I used some clear plastic on a roll that is used for packing stuff.) I held this on with double sided tape on the corners. This is to keep the dacron from being 'glued' to the planking when painting on the filler. In the figures, you can see the plastic sheeting, and the heat-n-bond ironed to the top of the planking. The heat-n-bond was set using a setting of 4 on the iron.
Worked from the center to the ends. At the ends, I cut the dacron close to length, and split up the center to where the bow (stern) 'breaks'. Turns out, I should have pulled to the gunnels further before splitting to make a neater and shorter split. I could pull tight almost to the end of the gunnels before splitting. Then I used 7/8" heat-n-bond, even with one side of the stem and overlapping the other side. I pulled the dacron over from the 'even' side and ironed on the stem and around to the overlapping side, but not to the edge of the glue. I used scissors to trim even with the edge of the glue, and then ironed that side to get good glue saturation. Then I put another layer of glue (7/8" heat-n-bond) over the first layer - that is, even with the same side as before, so now around the edge on the near side. Then I could iron on the dacron to the near side of the canoe, and trim the dacron even with the far edge of the stem. Hopefully, the outer edge will now be under (or just sticking out of the stem band - whenever I get to that...). I note that the under layer overlap on the one side is not visible.
At this point the dacron actually looked pretty tight. But, I ironed anyway at a setting of 4.5 from the keel down to the gunnels. Need to move the iron quite slowly to get the dacron to shrink fully to this setting. Again, looked quite tight, but being brave, I reset the iron to 5.5 and ironed again. This seems quite tight, and I decided to forego ironing at the highest setting. Note that for all this I tried to avoid ironing over any of the glue to keep it from letting go.
And on to filling the dacron. I went with Ekofill from Stewart Systems. Much thinner than I expected (not knowing what to expect). I only bought a quart figuring I would get at least 2 coats and that would be marginally enough. Well, I got 6 coats, and still have a bit left in the bottom of the can. I put it all on with a 3" foam brush, right from the can. First, up/down brush strokes, then lengthwise strokes alternating between coats. After the first coat is was quite splotchy, which you probably cannot see in the top 2 photos, but after the that, the color was nice and even. It took about 1.5 hours to paint on each coat. There was one soft area in the canvas at the tip of the bow that I noticed after the 3rd coat. Surprisingly, ironing at 5.5 took it right out. The only soft areas now are at the glued areas, not too bad, and should be under the gunnel.
top 2 photos after one coat- a bit blotchy, but you cannot really tell in the photos.
These photos are after 3 coats, much more, but again hard to tell from the photos.
After 6 coats, the weave is still not quite filled, but the color is nice and even, and the dacron has an almost rubbery feel. Note that I LIGHTLY sanded with 320 after the 5th coat to knock off any lumps that I missed as I was applying each coat.
Next up the Zinzer 123 primer. According to various postings, it should fill the weave giving a smooth finish. Unless I am painting too thin (as may be my tendency). Then install the keel before trying the paint.
In the mean time, I called Island Falls Canoe to order the next round of parts (note I picked up the outer gunnels and keel last spring). This order includes:
2 stem bands (2x$25)
Stem band screws (~30 1.25"x4 oval head)
keel screws and cup washers (~25 1"x8)
gunnel screws (box of 100 1.5"x8 (need ~60)
Paint - off white - interlux or ?? - 1qt
I'll try to add prices when things are delivered.
I'll try to post again after a couple of coats of primer...
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