March 5, 2025

PT11-71

Tuesday

Now that the hull paint had had a few days’ cure time, I was ready to move forward, and the next step was to reassemble the hulls for the first time since paint.  With a short day on tap, it seemed a good time for this job.

I started by reinstalling the four connecting pins, this  time with a bit of waterproof grease on the shaft where it passed through the aft bulkhead, and also in the threads of the forward bulkhead.  Once all the pins were reinstalled, I carefully connected the hull–the last time this would be done before the alignment clips were installed, and which would help with future connections.  I did this on the bench, but then moved the boat onto a pair of sawhorses positioned as indicated in the book, and once there, I released and resecured all the pins to ensure there was no binding.

I’d done the early layout and installation steps for the alignment clip before the boat was painted, and now, to install them for real, I started by installing a second pair of wooden spacers–with sticky tape on one side–to the clips, which would hold them just slightly off, and the proper distance from, the bulkhead.  Then, I drilled for and installed the mounting screws, just a dry-fit for now.

It’s funny how you notice things sometimes that blew by you the day before.  As I reviewed these photos, I noticed that I’d installed the alignment clips backwards, or on the wrong sides, something that I obviously didn’t notice during installation.  The angled side of the clip should face the sides of the boat, as this angle helps bring the forward half of the boat in and then lock it down in the single and proper location for securing.  But it was the first thing I noticed now, so I’d have to switch them around.  This posed no problem as the top parts of the clips were symmetrical, and I’d yet to finish off the installation with epoxy in the screw holes.