I Love Long Boarding

The sanding of the Peacemaker has begun.  We are using long board sanders to fair the hull (make smooth).  Right now the boat is not very fair at all because it was built poorly, so this sanding may take awhile.

Long boarding is hard work

Leo telling me to get back to work

Operation Make Peacemaker Straight Again

Long boarding is so much "fun"

The legendary two amigos long board

Long boarding covers the shop in not-healthy dust, so we have to wear the full face respirator.  It gets very hot and sweaty under the mask when you are long boarding.

The repairs on the main bulkhead are coming along well.  The first step was to apply a large fiberglass patch to one corner of the bulkhead.

It was a pretty big vacuum bag

The corner presented a challenge when vacuum bagging

The finished product

Then we added a fiberglass patch to the other side of the main bulkhead.  The final step will be to add fiberglass around the inside of the door way to connected the two skins.

Finally, we finished added fiberglass reinforcements to the tack line tubes.

Back at Webb, I have been improving my cooking game.

Chicken Tamale Pie (it was tasty)

Bulkhead Problems

Work on the keel fin continues.  We baked the keel fin in the makeshift oven seen below to provide the final cure.  Now the piece is ready to be CNC cut into the correct shape.

Next, we started preparing to repair the main bulkhead.  While removing the paint to prepare the bulkhead for repair, we discovered a problem.

The flange is the inside rim of the opening

Close up picture of the flange

As you can see, there is a white line of material in the middle of the flange.  This white material is filling a crack down the center of the bulkhead.  This means that the two fiberglass skins of the bulkhead are not connected.  This makes the bulkhead weak.  Basically, the original builders of the boat did a bad job.  We will have to repair the bulkhead by adding new fiberglass to join the two skins.

This is a picture of a properly made bulkhead (made by Leo and Vlad)

We also installed the tubing for the internal tack lines

The space heater is curing the carbon plate onto the bow

The tubing takes each tack line from the inside of the prod, through the bow, and up unto the deck

The foam block is holding the tubes at the right angle so the tack will run smoothly to the front of the prod

The tack line tubes inside the bow looking forward

The tack line tubes inside the bow looking aft

After the tubes where glued in, we added fiberglass to the two ends of the tube on the outside of the boat.

Tack line tube before the fiberglass is applied

First, the fiberglass, soaked in epoxy, is applied

Then the stack is added on top.  In this case the stack is peel ply and then a baby blanket

Then the vacuum seal is added on top of a stack of baby blanket and breather (this stack helps the vacuum to properly form) 

Vacuum tape is added around area

Finally, the vacuum is applied

Done

Finally, we have been preparing to install the rear starboard stanchion.  It is a very tight space in the back of the boat.  Being that I am the smallest, I have the easiest time getting back there.  Leo has been sending me back and then facetiming me so he can see what is going on without having to climb back there himself.

Last weekend I had the pleasure of watching my sister competitively rock climb.  Climbing is a surprisingly good spectator sport and I had a really fun time watching my sister.  She place 5th overall for the weekend, meaning that she qualified for bouldering nationals.

I finished my weekend by catching up with my classmates living who are living in Newport Rhode Island and working at New England Boatworks.

The Adventure Begins

Hello internet, my name is Ben Hunt.  I'm a freshman at the Webb Institute and I'm working this winter for a company which the school calls Brewers Marine.  Really, I'm working for Webb's two offshoring sailing coaches, Leo and Vlad, in a tent in the Brewer Yacht Yard.  I'm attempting to help Leo and Vlad modify Peacemaker, a Kerr 11.5, for Webb to sail in the spring.

Peacemaker before any modifications 

Source: Ker Designs

My Work

My first couple days on the job were full of information overload.  I learned all about peel ply, bleeders, breathers, baby blankets, vacuum bags and more that Leo and Vlad use to make the composite parts for Peacemaker.  You can see some peel ply in the image below, it's the paper looking stuff.  The peel ply gives the material a finished that allows you to bond other parts to it without having to sand the surface first.

The peel ply is covering the tabbing we added to the stern bulkhead.  We added the tabbing to this bulkhead because the original builder decided not to.  This left the bulkhead poorly attached to the rest of the boat.

Bulkhead before the tabbing is added

I also got to do a lot of foam removal from the hatch Leo and Vlad replaced.  The old hatch was poorly made and falling apart.

Old Hatch

New Hatch

Before

Middle

After

It is fun to get to crawl around a sailboat all day, but it can be claustrophobic at times.

We also started working on the modifications to the keel.

New part of the keel in a vacuum bag

Finally, I got to cut the old stanchion mounts off the inside of the boat to save weight.

Life alone at Webb has been an adventure.  The building makes a lot weird sounds when it empty.  Luckily I'm learning the sources of most of them.  For example, when you hear a door slam right outside your room it is the fire escape door that does not latch, not an intruder.  I also got the pleasure of performing a one man jump start of my car with a Webb van (I would have got a picture but my phone was too cold to turn on) after I left a light on overnight.

There is not toaster in the student kitchen, so I have been perfecting the art of toasting bread on a frying pan.