Sunday 14 June 2009

Repairing a pretty 11ft rowing/sailing dinghy

I am currently repairing a dinghy for a client. The boat has five floors (or floor timbers) in it, these are structural members that run athwartships across the keel.  The function of the floors is to tie the two halves of the boat together. 

The construction of this boat is glued clinker plywood. At the ends of
three of the floors the plywood has delaminated, possibly due to being stood on whilst sailing, the plywood giving way when stress loaded to the none flexible floor. This problem has occurred to the ends of two of the floors on the starboard side, the floor amidships under the thwart and the next floor aft. On the port side the delamination has occurred to the floor immediately forward of the one running amidships. 

So, that is the problem, so how is it being fixed? Well the solution is this:

1. remove the offending floors;
2. epoxy the delaminated ply back together;
3. make some nice new floors out of sapele, these will extend elegantly up the side of the hull to just below the thwart riser, thus spreading the load and stiffening the hull too.

This weekend I have removed the floors and epoxy glued the delaminated plywood back together. I am just waiting on the wood to arrive and then I can make and fix the new floors. 

I am really enjoying repairing this boat. The best bit tod
ay was figuring out the best way to clamp the glued plywood together. The one under the thwart was easy, the one aft of this a bit more tricky, but its amazing what you can do with a few scraps of wood and a couple of bricks!


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