Friday 13 June 2014

Apple Pie

So I have a hard dinghy that gets me in and out to the boats just fine but is too big to take anywhere
with Teal and we detest the inflatable so when I was ordering the ply and fiberglass for the work on my other boat I also ordered ply and epoxy to build an Apple Pie dinghy.
I've never built a stitch and glue boat so its a bit of a change from working on something like Teal.
The Apple Pie is a 7' x 3'6" pram dinghy, Just about big enough for two adults at a shove. The plans are free on http://intheboatshed.net/free-boat-plans-at-intheboatshednet/  although after trying to fit the bits together I realised that the offsets for the floor where wrong and that updated plans are also available on line, the result is the bottom of my dinghy is now 3 inches narrower but its too late to change it. I just assumed the transom measurements were wrong and not the numerous bottom measurements so I just narrowed the transoms (wrong) . I'm hoping the dinghy might be small enough to fit on Teals coachroof if we really don't want to tow it.




I cut out the ply and stitched it with cable ties, it took probably 6 hours to mark,cut, stitch and fillet it. The design certainly doesn't get the most out of your ply sheets and you could definitely make a larger boat with the same amount. I filleted the seams with thickened epoxy and sheathed the inside with 195gsm woven rovings and epoxy. Sanding the fillets and sheathing the inside took around 3 hours. I now need to buy more epoxy before I can go much further, but I can go ahead and cut the seat bulkhead and prep the exterior for sheathing.

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