I Haven't Screwed up the Caprail Yet!

I keep reminding myself that I am just one errant cut away from a very expensive mistake so I have been taking it very slowly.  So far, I've successfully rough cut 5 of the 6 pieces to cover the port and starboard bulkwarks (the stern is another piece, but I'm not counting that one yet).  I haven't had much time this week to do much else, but I didn't manage to carefully whittle and fit the stem section to a good fit.  Now I just need to cut the final scarf to get the starboard side completely roughed in.


This weekend I plan on getting the port side roughed in as well and then things get tricky.  I still haven't decided exactly how I am going to attach the trim piece that covers the hull/deck joint.  The original method was to have the trim piece flush with the top of the cap rail (labeled 'B' in diagram).  The problem with this is that there is a vertical seam that opens up over time.  The advantage is that if you bang into something hard enough you can replace the trim piece instead of the whole caprail (or part of it).

Method A was implemented nicely by the owner of A-35 Quickbeam out on the west coast.  I think it's a better design overall but there are 2 things keeping me from pulling the trigger on this method.  1 - if/when I bump into things hard, the repair cost/effort will be more difficult, and 2 - The angles up toward the bow section make for some pretty tricky cuts.  I've gone back and forth over the past few days, and I need to spend some quality time on the boat doing some test pieces before I make a final decision.  In any event, things are progressing and I hope to have a solution in the next few days.  Stay tuned.

Time for a Bender

I haven't had time to get to the lumberyard to buy all the mahogany I'll need for the toerail project, but I've been anxious to get going and the dinghy project isn't too time consuming.  I had some scrap mahogany lying around and decided that I should test out my laminated toerail theory to make sure I actually can bend it on the toerail jig I put together.

First things first though, it was time for a new toy.  I have wanted to get a thickness planer for years but could never really justify it because I was able to do most of my edge jointing with a jack plane and had good results. The difference is that this time I would effectively need to joint 140 feet and it would take way too much time.  Arguably, I should have purchased a dedicated jointer for this job, but I also see the need for a thickness planer and I know a few people who do edge jointing with a thickness planer.  So it came down to: "If you had to choose, what would you get?".

I did some research and found that while I would love to get the DeWalt DW735 planer, it just isn't in the budget.  I ended up choosing the low end Porter Cable TP305 (rebranded Delta 305).  It was on sale at Lowes for $249 and I had a 10% off coupon so I ended up getting it for $225. I spent some time tuning it to reduce snipe and got it to a reasonable level (I figured snipe loss into the cost of the mahogany I need to purchase).

Once I had the planer running the way I wanted, I cut 3-1-1/8 inch pieces of mahogany about 2.5 feet long (the length of the scrap I had).  I ran all the pieces through the planer to make nice jointing edges and test fitted them on the toerail jig.  The final planed with for each piece was about 1-1/16.  Once I was confident that I could bend the pieces onto the jig I mixed up a small batch of epoxy, painted all the edges and bent them onto the jig.

I left the layup overnight and came back in the morning to find it 'dry'.  This was a mistake.  It seemed dry, but I failed to recognize the force involved in bending the wood on the curve.  When I first pulled the layup off the jig it appeared that there was minimal springback (~1/16 inch) and it appeared to hold the curve, but when I brought it upstairs to show my wife about an hour later it was clear that it was losing its curve.  I hope that this was due to the epoxy still being green (the overnight cure was in 50-55 degree temps so I don't believe the 12 hours I had it on the jig was long enough.  I am going to seek some advice on the forums to see if this is in fact the case, or if the wood will naturally spring back regardless epoxy over time.  This will mean that I'll have to get the rail on the boat immediately after pulling it off the jig.  If this is the case, I'll need to wait until the temps. are warmer outside so I can get the bulwark prepped and ready to go.

Springback looks good... for a little while at least.

Overall, I think this was a success though.  I may have to adjust some schedules to account for springback, but I think I have proven that the lamination will work as designed.  I am going to run the piece through the planer once I am sure it is really dry (I don't want to gum the knives up) to see how the quasi finished rail will look like.  Inspecting the joints looks like they are really tight and will look good.  Edit: Below is a post planer picture.  It looks good to me, even if the grain isn't correct.  Once I get the real wood, I will take care to keep the grain together.

Last Post

Last post for the year at least. The last month and a half has been pretty crazy and I haven't done much of anything on the boat. The holidays are always kind of a mess when it comes to working on the boat and this year was no exception.  Given that we've had some pretty good weather, I'm kicking myself a bit for not getting out there and forging ahead.  Oh well, I was getting burned out from the constant juggling of boat, family, and job so I took the time off with no regrets.

For the winter, I have 2 main projects; laminate the new toerail and sand the decks fair so once warm weather arrives I can get started with primer and paint.  Today I had some time and decided that I wasn't up for sanding so I jumped into the toerail project (building projects are always better than sanding projects).

I've agonized over how to do the toerail for some time now.  Initially I was going to scarve a bunch of 3/4x3" mahogany and bend it on to the rail, but after talking with a few folks who have done it, I was worried that I would break the rail when bending it on.  It can be done, but I'm not willing to risk several hundred dollars in exotic wood on a chance.  It has to be right the first time.

The method I came up with should look good, will run no risk of breaking, and could possibly be a cheaper solution.  I'm going to laminate 3 - 1" pieces on a form that has the same curve as the bulwark (See bad drawing below).

Anyway, to get started I had to remove the existing toerail.  I left it in place over the course of the recore to serve as a splash guard for the hull, but now that that is about done I'm comfortable removing it.  I had taken out a bunch of the screws previously, but there was still about half left and I had to use a hacksaw to remove the genoa track.  The track was fastened through the entire bulwark and into the cabin where the nuts turned into a rusty ball of nastyness over the years so there was no hope recovering the 5" drift bolts.

Once I had gotten the toerail off I laid 1'x8' pieces of plywood that I had previously cut down on the exposed bulwark and traced the curve of the hull onto them.  I brought them back to my basement shop and screwed a bunch of blocks 3" behind the curve.  Next I test fitted a piece of 1" mahogany to the curve to see how difficult it would be to bend.  To my relief, it bent on without any problem at all.

In the next few weeks or so, I'll take a trip over to Goosebay lumber in Chicester and buy up a bunch of mahogany.  To do the lamination, I'll butt 2 of the plywood forms together (of the 4 total) so I'll only have one scarf in the middle.  I haven't figured out exactly how I'll do the bow and stern because they widen out somewhat. See you next year!