Laminating a tiller

One of the things I've been working on between other jobs is creating a tiller.  Rather than reinvent the wheel, I decided to use an existing pattern created by Dale Simonson.  You can see the details of the layout here: Dale Simonson's tiller pattern

I drew out the pattern on a piece of scrap plywood, and glued down blocks that I could clamp to. Then it was just a matter of cutting the strips and planing them down to about 5/16" thickness. The thickest part of this lamination took just over 6 strips, and not all of the strips needed to be full length, since the profile of the tiller is not constant.  I used walnut and a contrasting strip of maple the second one down from the top.

Before gluing I put packing tape down on the form so the glue wouldn't stick. Glueup was then straightforward, using regular wood glue.  The curves are gentle and easy to achieve.

After the glue dried, I cleaned up  the squeeze out and then planed it down to a thickness that matches the opening in the rudder head.

I then glued up a smaller blank for the hiking stick.  I put packing tape on the tiller and laminated the hiking stick right on top, so that the curves match.

Then it was a matter of removing any wood that didn't look like a tiller.  The profile changes from square at the end that inserts into the rudder head, to roughly round at the hand end.

I used my Shinto rasp, a spokeshave, and sandpaper to shape this part.  I think it feels best when there is a little increase in diameter towards the end, like a pitchfork handle.  In this photo from above you can see that curve a bit.

I also like a bit of a knob at the end so your hand can tell where the end is.  Axe handles are like this.  I ended up glueing on another thickness of wood at the end so I had enough to shape.

I also found I didn't like the feel of the handle when it was completely rounded, so I put a little flat on the bottom side.  This also helps your hand know where it is on the tiller shaft.

I also rounded off the hiking stick and reduced the diameter on the end to fit into the Ronstan universal joint that holds these two parts together.  Here's how that looks.

To finish this off I need to drill out the hole at the rudder end and epoxy in a bushing, then epoxy coat overall and varnish.

More hull panels and a Whoops!

I have continued to install more hull panels, and it's been rewarding to start to get a more complete feel of what this boat will look like.  

After applying a panel I come back about a day later and hit the edges of the fiberglass tape with a scraper to smooth off the rough edge.  The tape has a little structure at the edge that sticks up and is rough, and one edge is worse than the other.  The scraper made quick work of it.

And after vacuuming up the shavings we see this.  I don't intend to attempt to further smooth this out.  It's inside the storage area, and all I care about is that there are no rough edges to snag anything I store in there.  the inside of the hull panel and fiberglass tape will get one more coat of epoxy to ensure all is sealed, and then two coats Rustoleum Gloss White to finish it off.

I found that the front of the garboard panel curved across the center line due to the keel from the bow transom down to the bottom of the hull having a slight curve.  

I used a plane to trim that panel back to the center line so that it would not interfere with the panel on the starboard side.

I then took a look at where the material was removed, and how much was taken, and got out the spokeshave to make the other side look the same

After installing the panel, the front edges meet up nicely. 

Moving on to panel number two, things got a little more difficult.  The bottom hull panel rested against the hull bottom, but panel 2 doesn't have that luxury.  I ended up suspending the panel with some thin nylon straps to get it roughly into position, and then wired it on in a few places.

I then took out some wires and loosened others.

This left the hull panel hanging loose enough so that I could get under there to apply thickened epoxy to the lap joint and then tighten things up again.

So, current status is four hull panels installed, filleted, and taped.

And it's looking like a boat!

But alas, all is not perfect.  I got so into getting hull panels installed that I forgot I needed to use the seats to align the bulkheads.  I've had some issues with this plywood in that the pieces tend to warp and twist somewhat.  Not sure why that is, but the net result in this case is that all the bulkheads no longer line up with the slots in the seats.  Whoops! 

This is the worst one.  Looks like I'll need to open up the slot on one side, and fill it in with epoxy (wood flour fillet mixture) on the other.  Should not be a big deal, and the hull panel shape looks good.

My wife consoled me, saying that no one would ever notice as long as I didn't blab it all over the internet or something :-)

Bulkhead access holes... continued

Tonight I finished cutting out the access holes and cleaned them up.  I sanded to the lines in the corners using a drum sander on the drillpress:

And then a spokeshave made quick work of bringing the straight edges down to the mark:

Following that, I sanded the sharp edges into a nice radius, so these pieces are ready to be epoxy coated.