JEM Watercraft

Hello all,
Just started stitching the bottom panels up on the merrimac and am having a bear of a time getting them to fit. I checked all measurments and found the only thing of any significance was that the over all length of the bottom panels fell about three quarters of an inch short of what the plans call for. I dont quite understand this because the individual four panels that make up the bottom halves are spot on the layout.

when I stitch the panels together I am left with a half inch gap in the middle and the center section of the bottom bows up. I have lots of hard spots near the ends of the seam too. in short the whole bottom is quite warped and twisted. I am hoping that someone can tell me it this is a normal situation that will be evened out when other panels are stitched on or if I should start over some scratch with the bottom. once again, any help is much appreciated.

thanks ,
Bob

Could you maybe post a photo It maybe worth a thousand words

In my experience Matts plans and dimension checks are spot on 3/4" is quiet an error.

I would be laying panels flat again and rechecking your QA measurements

If keel bulges in could it not be pursuaded to bulge out as you stitch

Good Luck all is not lost yet.

Sorry you're having these troubles.

It does sound unusual. Bemm made a good suggestion in rechecking some measurements of your bottom panels. If they are off, you could make new ones or perhaps correct the current ones. Not the ideal situation but at least nothing is glued up yet.

I'd say before that, check your frame dimensions (easier to do) and make sure you didn't make an error with those.

And please do post a picture if you can.

Hi Matt,
Well I am stumped! I cant wrap my head around this one. I would love to send you a picture but I cannot figure out how. I have a half inch gap extending about 8 inches either side of the splice on the center seam of the bottom. If I bring the seam together the bottom center of the boat warps up (oposite of rocker. In my QA drawings it shows the bottom panel to be one quarter inch from the string line at center, so when the two halves are placed together I am left with a half inch gap that I cannot get rid of. I placed stitches in the ends and in the middle only and ran a one eighth inch cutting bit with my dremel down the center of the seam relieving a bit of tension. This did help, but not enough. can I fill this half inch gap? hope this painted a pretty clear picture for you, at least until I can figure out how to send photos. I have stitched up the mid panels and one top panel hoping that something would pull into alignment and the problem would resolve, no luck so far. I hate to have to start over on the bottom but if that is what it takes.

Thanks again,
Bob

Don't know if this is of any help but your problem sounds similar to one I had.
While joining two bottom panels, to make one long one, I misread the drawings due to my cheap/old/crappy printer being as vague as I can be at times.
What I did was reverse the angle. I managed to do this by drawing a straight line on the floor to align the panels (Which in itself was ok) But then I matched the ends of the panels correctly on the line but raised the panels at the join, (about 5/16ths if I recall correctly) that is the middle of the two panels ABOVE the line, I needed to go BENEATH the line to create the correct angle.
Dunno if this is what you've done, but if so it was easily cut and rejoined successfully.
Regards John.

Image posting.

It is much quicker and easier to crop,edit and re-size your images BEFOFRE you try to upload them to an image hosting site. There are lots of free programs available to help you do this.. This one works very well for me.

http://www.vso-software.fr/products/image_resizer/

Fast, safe and you can re-size your whole album in one go.

Image hosting sites, Millions of them mate. I like Photobucket the best. You can create as many albums and albums within albums as you like for all your different adventures or trips or interests and for mine, photobucket is the easiest to use.

I recently joined an Oz photographic forum in an attemt to improve my photographic skills and on their recommendation, also joined imageshack but I don't think it is nearly as convenient as photobucket.

Mate, I am the original IT idiot and even I can do this. If you join Photobucket, I will walk you through the processs if you like.

On the QA2 drawing, do you see where it says "To inside of panel edge"?

That means the string, when properly aligned, should lay on top of the panel and not be to the outside of the panel. Is that how you did you alignment?

Can you email me a picture and I'll post it?

Well, thats what I did guys, aligned the panels above the string line instead of below. Thank you so much for the help, I just thought for sure I was reading the plans right, would of been scratching my head for a while without your help. I am going to go buy another sheet of ply today and strart the bottom from scratch. I see how valuable the availability of contact with other builders on this site can be.

Very appreciative,
Bob

Yep, thats what I did. I had the string line below the bottom edge of the panel. I cut and glued up new bottom panels last night with the proper alignment (string line above bottom edge). Thanks guys for the help, what a valuable web site this is. I am learning how to get my photos from photobucket to this forum, hope that I can contribute to this site in some way.

thanks again,
Bob

Great! Well not great that you had to deal with this but great that you worked it out.

And thank you for posting the question. You've just helped someone else who might have the same question or situation. You're contributing already!