Steps in Building a SCAMP sailboat

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Installing the 2 layers of the floor which close in the watertight compartments and ballast tank.

Once the paint dried could start gluing in the floor. Read about preparing the watertight compartments and water ballast tank.

I put 3 coats of paint in the floor compartments. I had some brightside polyurethane left over and used that for the water ballast tank. It's a bit yellower. The floor sections also got some paint.

Before I could glue down the floor, I used some paint stripper to remove some epoxy I had smeared in the thread section of the filling hole for the water ballast tank.

I put lots of epoxy glue down and glued the front floor section. I did not use any screws but the weights did a great job.

It was a bit tricky to lay down the floor. I asked my Nick to help me. I had put lots of glue down, in particular I was generous with the glue around the water compartment. Weights and some screws were used. The floor has 2 layers. This is the bottom layer.

Before the glue had set I went around and cleaned up any drips on the inside and extra glue around the edges.

Installing the Sole Liner

Positioning the sole liner is trickier than I had expected. I had decided where I wanted the liner to go and had marked this but I was not confident I could just drop it magically in the right spot. It's 8 feet long and heavy enough to be hard to move around. To fit in the top has to be tilted and placed in sideway through the bulkhead. I finally made up little spacing blocks and temporarily screwed them onto the floor. With the blocks in place I did not have to adjust the positioning at all.

It's not so hard when everything is nice and dry but It's going to be harder when everything is gummy with epoxy and I only have about 20 minutes to get it down and screwed in position.

After putting the positioning blocks on the floor I made sure the piece was well wedged in and drilled some holes to make it easier to temporarily attach the floor while the epoxy sets. I made little plywood blocks covered in plastic tape so the screws don't mark the top.

The screws will go through the top and bottom plywood and screw into the crosspieces I had on the bottom of the various bulkheads. The screws will pull down the plywood and hopefully extra epoxy will squeeze out. I'll remove them and fill the holes after the glue has set.

In order to allow extra epoxy and trapped air to squeeze out, the instructions are to drill a series of holes. These get filled later when the floor gets faired.

I marked the screw holes with green tape so in the rush I don't confuse my various holes.

How I dropped the liner with no help

It took me a while to figure out how I would drop the floor liner onto the floor. Because of the limited open time of epoxy it had to happen quickly. I eventually set up a small block and just lowered the floor in place.

I positioned the front of the liner on top of the little blocks, when it's time to glue the floor I'll just have to pull it till the edge drops off the positioning blocks. That lifted it just enough to allow me to spread the glue in. The back end of the sole liner has a temporary c clamp to give me something to attach on to. I had set up a small block from the garage door track and was able to pull the liner up and out of the way. I attached the end of the line to the hole in the transom.

The floor was pulled high enough to allow me to reach the front part to spread the epoxy glue. I had to stretch a bit, but it was not difficult. The back part of the floor was easy to reach.

I had not heated the room much so the epoxy was cold and it was workable for a longer period than the usual 30 or so minutes.

It was a simple procedure to lower the liner and to nudge it so it was nicely lined up with the little white blocks I had placed to position the top.

I scuttled around and screwed the floor down. A satisfactory amount of glue squeezed out of the breather holes I had made. My weight helped squeeze the panel down. I added a few more 5/8 pan head screws I found in my shelves for good measure and I had some clamps ready to help keep the panel down around the various openings where I'm putting circular hatches.

I had a few bricks so I put them down in spots that had fewer screws.

All that was left to do was to clean up the extra glue on the edge of the panel and on the top and let it set enough so I could remove the screws. I went back later in the evening and did this with some of the screws but I left a few in. The epoxy was not completely set and I had a couple of spots that wanted some clamping on the outside edges.

When I tried to take them out the next morning 3 screw heads broke off. Stainless screws are not as strong as steel. After some un-ladylike expletitives I got my soldering iron out and vice grips and went to work.

Heat would soften epoxy and release the screw that was nicely glued in, I hoped. In fact it worked really well and there was just enough of the screw bottom sticking out to clamp on with the vice-grips. So no real problem. I see some sanding and filleting in my future.

When I prepared the floor and the liner, I had marked and cut the round hatch holes in the floor but only marked and rough cut them on the liner to allow for any variation in positioning. I had aligned the 2 pieces flush at the transom when I marked the rough position of the liner, which was a mistake. Luckily for me only 2 of the 5 holes needed patching.

After gluing in the liner I used the router with a flush cut bit to cut the opening on the liner. The bearing used the floor opening as a pattern so the top and bottom layers are perfectly cut, except for the ones I had mispositioned. This freud flush bit has been with me for around 15 years and I've used it on every boat I built. It's starting to get a bit worn and just a bit rusty but talk about value for money.

After making small cardboard templates I marked and cut some leftover plywood and glued it in position. Since there is a third layer reinforcing the opening which is glued below the floor, I'm not worried about strength.

Instructions on the manual suggest filling the screw holes and putting tape over to smooth out the epoxy. I filled the holes but the tape did not want to stick, there was a thin layer of epoxy left over from scraping the filling in. I guess I'll be sanding and re filling any that is not quite full. Before doing the epoxy I had spent a couple of hours sanding and smoothing various fillets and dealing with a drip or 2.

My next step will be to fillet all around the drainage ditch and to smooth the fillets and filled screw holes. I see more sanding in my future.

The mis-cut holes are repaired, filled, and sanded.

I also got the fillets around the floor done. To quote cookie monster, "not bad but not terrific."

Some sanding and first coat of epoxy on the sole liner. At this point it's filling and sanding but there are no major parts to go one the floor and lockers.

emails: Christine

If you decide to build a boat be careful. These tools can be dangerous. If you don't know how to safely handle something find out. There are lots of forums out there.

This web site reflects my personal ideas and doesn't represent anyone else's point of view. I don't claim to be an expert in anything, just someone muddling along.