The plug has now had 2 coats of wax, none silicon type specially made for mould release! It will have two more waxings tonight and then one tomorrow morning before a coating of release agent.

Once the release agent it will be given its' first layer….the gelcoat, tomorrow night, as late as possible in a heated workshop, before laying up the chopped strand matting on wednesday morning.

This afternoon I re-organised a working area where I could lay out all the materials and start cutting the matting into strips, rectangles and triangles for the different areas of the plug to be covered.

Also, I split the matting.

I always order a heavier weave of matting as it works out cheaper in the long run, is easier to lay up without the hassle of getting a roller into tight areas once split into thinner sheets, and on tight curves such as working around the belting and into the tight groove made between the belting and the flance it is forgiving and never collects air bubbles, as long as you don't lay up too much whilst the resin is still "wet", especially when working with small width brushes to stipple the mat into the grooves.

So!, from tomorrow its all hands on deck!, and no rest until the mould is finished by the weekend.

And it was such a delight to smell that oudor of grp resin again….not done any glassing up for at least 8 years.

as Tim says, the resin is pre accellerated., and with the "slow" catylist I get around 30 – 40 minutes working time maximum , so i can judge after many years at the game just how much i can lay in such time……………but no stops for a breather…..none stop stippling lol.

never needed to use rovings Tim, as the models i build have very few right aangles or sharp corners, even the keel has rounded edges which, the split thinner layers of matting cope well with as they don't have the same quality as a 450 gram matting which as a single layer can be very stiff to mould around a right angle or corner.

The plug has now had 2 coats of wax, none silicon type specially made for mould release! It will have two more waxings tonight and then one tomorrow morning before a coating of release agent.

Once the release agent it will be given its' first layer….the gelcoat, tomorrow night, as late as possible in a heated workshop, before laying up the chopped strand matting on wednesday morning.

This afternoon I re-organised a working area where I could lay out all the materials and start cutting the matting into strips, rectangles and triangles for the different areas of the plug to be covered.

Also, I split the matting.

I always order a heavier weave of matting as it works out cheaper in the long run, is easier to lay up without the hassle of getting a roller into tight areas once split into thinner sheets, and on tight curves such as working around the belting and into the tight groove made between the belting and the flange it is forgiving and never collects air bubbles, as long as you don't lay up too much whilst the resin is still "wet", especially when working with small width brushes to stipple the mat into the grooves.

So!, from tomorrow its all hands on deck!, and no rest until the mould is finished by the weekend.

And it was such a delight to smell that oudor of grp resin again….not done any glassing up for at least 8 years.

we all have surreel moments Richard.

i had one yesterday and am still laughing at it……but nothing to do with modellng.

i dropped my daughter off on a street in blackpool notorious for deadbeats…it was the rear entrance to he staff at a hotel on blackpool prom. having watched from a distance that she got into the hotel safely i started driving home.

10 minutes later she rang me from her Apple i phone to say she had lost her apple watch that her boyfriend had bought her for christmas, and could i come back and look for it on the street.

racing back i thought, no chance………and no chance was there i couldn't find it. so text her to say no.

she rang me and said, its in your car as i have satalite tracking from phone to watch, and so i went to the location after calling the police to report it lost or stolen, as t was now on the move from place to place.

she kept sending me locations and i kept following until by 14.00 hours i gave up as every time i got to the place where the vehicle location had been i made enquiries, but no one seemed to know anything. i told her that i would wait until the vehicle had parked up for the night and then go out to see who ever was driving.

Baring in mind that the watch had cost £500 at Christmas i was determined to find it, but by now had lost the will to live, lol.

at 14.50 hours a chap rang my mobile and asked, are you the father and next of kin to a Mollie……….omg i thought, and then remembered she had programmed me in as her contact!…..i asked…….are you a gentleman holding an apple i watch……..yes came the answer! I told him my daughter had lost it on Dixon road……yes , one of my gulley sweeper drivers had seen it in the road, and picked it up before he swepped it in to the vehicle tank with the brushes, but as we don't allow the drivers to take their phones with them he couldn't report it until he arrived back at the depot 10 minutes ago.

I had been following a bloody road sweeper all day, and at one stage passed it on the road.never in my world of scenario's had i thought that each stop on the sat nav tracking that it was a gulley wash out, and not an Amazon delivery lol ….i slipped the foreman and the driver 20 quid each to buy a beer or too………what a wierd day yesterday was………

thank goodness today is going ok so far. lol.

TIME FLIES when you are having fun???

Well it has done since I laid the first brush full of white gelcoat last night!

In all, taking in to account cutting the chop strand mat and splitting it into thinner sizeable pieces for handy laying down, the gelcoat mixing and painting on to the half side of the plug, and then two sessions of laying up the hull in two seperate sessions, the whole process of laying up that one side has taken me nearly 6 hours in total……….

But I am pleased with the result before my eyes, and if the mould turns out as good as it looks,

I'll be a happy bunny!

As forcast, the second half of the mould has now had its wax and release agent applied…………

And the gelcoat has been painted on to the plug.

If all goes well the chop strand matting will be laid up as was the first side, tomorrow, and then left to cure over the weekend, when by Sunday afternoon, I'll trim off the waste and some of the flange down to a narrower strip all round and then drill the flanges, whilst still attached to the plug for the coach bolts to eventually hold the two halves of the mould together, for the process of laying up some hulls.

And now that the main hull mould has gone off and started it's curing process over the next couple of days, my attention moved on to the cabin/engine casing plug.

I had waxed it a few weeks ago and this was still obvious to the touch, and so I painted on the blue release agent.

Once it had dried I applied the gelcoat to the read starboard side, amd tomorrow will lay up the chopped strand matting to that area.

On a charge now, and hopefully should have this mould completed by sunday night.

Hi, Richard….exactly right…….I wouldn't think of building in any other way these days.

And besides, I enjoy fibre glass moulding infinitely more than I do plank on frame building.

There is a gent called John Allen who is building the most exquisite, and beautiful lifeboat from plank on frame, and I just lust after his skills, knowing that even with my long years of building, I could never ever reach those heights in experience, and I believe, it is his first POF model……..just amazing workmanship and skills.

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Edited By neil howard-pritchard on 01/10/2022 16:53:27

Edited By neil howard-pritchard on 01/10/2022 16:54:05

anyway……..happy memories, and i often wonder if my canoe is still sailing.

so back to the build….

The second side gelcoated,

And all the chopped strand matting cut and ready for laying up tomorrow morning……..

Thats if I can get up early enough after a couple of beers tonight,