Shaping the Toe Rails, Laminate Repair (Bow), and Measuring for Fasteners

January 1, 2020

Happy New Year!  I made a fairly early start on the boat today, arriving and getting to work by 11am...pretty good after having a late night that included champagne, among other cocktail imbibe-ables.

I started on the toe rails on arrival.  After removing the protective plastic sheeting (during the epoxy glue-up process) and tape guarding the teak surrounding the glue joints, I began sanding with 180-grit discs.  I choose a higher grit disc in order to "creep up" on the desired sanding results.  This wasn't just sanding down a length of 24' + toe rail; rather, it was sanding down a length of 24' + toe rail FOUR times...so, this was a bit of an exercise.  When I completed the sanding, removing all of the excess epoxy squeeze out, I turned my attention to shaping the outboard and inboard surface of the rails.

I wanted a "softer" edge on the outboard side and a bit more vertical on the inboard side of the toe rail.  To that end, I outfitted the small laminate router with a 1/2" round over for the outboard edge and a 1/4" round over for the inboard edge.

The results looked really great.  I was happy with the profile of the rails, and so choose to move forward.  There was a bit of a rough edge on the cut lines, so I cleaned those up by hand....moving up and down the rail until the surfaces were suitably blended.

I chose to leave the forward and aft ends of the toe rails untouched for now, since I would also be custom shaping the joinery with both the bow cap and the taff rail.

The port toe rail had a bit of checking that required filling with epoxy in order to stabilize the rail.  I was slightly worried about how this area may behave during installing, bending the rail into the profile of the boat's outboard lines.  I mixed an ounce and a half of epoxy resin, used that to wet out the areas requiring fill work, and then proceeded to thicken the balance of the resin with wood filler (fine saw dust I had collected from past work).  The wood filler served a couple purposes: thickening the resin so that I could work the material into the toe rail voids and have it stay there, and also to color match (more or less) the teak wood tones.

I taped off the work areas prior to wetting them out and filling them.  I'll come back in the next couple days, remove the tape, and then sand to fair in the surfaces.

I was really hoping to prime the bow laminate repair...today, along with the motor mount area, but alas no.  After sanding the second round of fairing compound, I ran my hand across the surface a good 5-dozen times, and was just not happy with what I was feeling.  Knowing that the Alexseal ($) Flag Blue would show all surface inconsistencies, I knew I had to apply a third coat.  I cleaned the surface up with acetone, mixed another small batch of fairing compound, and applied it with a 10" knife to help spread and bridge any low spots.

My last order of business was to begin measuring and tallying the fastener needs for brightwork installations.  I started with the toe rails, port side aft.  I decided on a 9" spacing pattern, more of less.  Meaning that if I encountered a hull-to-deck joint fastener I would give an inch to either side of that fastener, maintaining roughly 9" of spacing along the entirety of the rail - 66 total fasteners required: #12 - 24 machine screws, 1.75" in length; requiring washers and nuts

Next, I measured for the coaming boards.  I decided on a spacing pattern of 2 screws every 12", for a total of 28 fasteners, 1/4" - 20 machine screws, 3" in length; requiring washers and nuts.

I moved on to the bow cap.  Here I decided to opt for 3 crews on each side, for a total of 6 fasteners - #12 - 24 machine screws, 1.75" in length; requiring washers and nuts.

The taff rail came next.  Due to the compound curves that the taff rail would take upon installation, I chose a robust 1/4" - 20 machine screw, 1.5" in length; requiring washers and nuts.

Finally, I moved into the boat to measure for the battery box and landing platform - at least a few components of it.  The supports for the landing platform - two per side - would call for a total of 12 1/4" - 20 machine screws, 1.75" in length; requiring washers and nuts.  I also selected fasteners for the battery cradle - to secure the battery forward and aft as well as side to side.  Here, I selected 4 1/4" - 20 machine screws, 1.75" in length; requiring washers and nuts.

All fasteners measured for today would be 316 stainless steel.

Total Time Today: 6 hrs