Bow/Stern Filleting

[jem]

Recently received an e-mail question about assembling the bow/stern of a Swamp Girl that I thought was worth sharing:

Here's the original question:

> Matt, I finally have the hull bottom stitched together
> with the frames attached. It looks good except right
> at the ends where it is a battle to have them line up.
> They want to slip over each other.
> You mentioned something about a radius on the ends.
> Could you explain that again? It seems like an
> internal stem or an end pour would do the trick.

And here's my response:

You could do a couple things:

Use the spacer method to stitch the bows together. That way the panels
won't slip over each other. Double up on the spacer sticks to leave a
wider gap (explained better in the following paragraphs)

You could also sand/trim the bow panels for a more even fit.

In either case, you can leave a bigger gap between the panels on the bows. You'll just use a little more thickened epoxy to fill in the gap. This
will also make your fillet radious bigger. A bigger radious is easier to
glass over on the inside and outside of the hull.

If you're using e-glass, the e-glass will conform nicely to tight curves. You might have to poke it in a little with a brush or gloved finger but it will lay just fine.

Best method is to tack weld the seam so the gap is completely filled. Let
that cure. Then apply a larger fillet with new filleting material. While that filleting material is still wet but not runny (give it about 15 minutes to cure), coat the seam, including the fillet, with epoxy and lay your cloth over that.

Then work the air bubbles out. With the filleting material wet, it'll help burp the air bubbles and work with the tape to form your seam.

I consider end-pours secondary for strength. Every attempt should be made to install glass on that seam first. Then do an endpour as a back up.