General CNC Kit Question

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greatlakesmann
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Re: General CNC Kit Question

Post by greatlakesmann »

So, what is the general consensus on the P19 Pilot? It's got a little more length than the C17 and comes with the full pilothouse and looks a bit bigger in the cuddy as well, sort of like an upscaled C17. I would probably close off the back of the pilothouse with a door, and put a bimini over the back deck. To me, it almost seems like the P19 is a good cross between the C17 and the DE23.

OneWayTraffic
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Re: General CNC Kit Question

Post by OneWayTraffic »

C17 head: There is room for a small portable one in my C17. But I would need to compromise something else, and there is very little privacy on such a small boat. I'd probably just use a bucket. There is room to lie down in the cabin, though I am building my consoles into the cabin somewhat as I might never sleep in it. I am retaining the ability to sleep in it, but it won't be convenient.

C17 hardtop shelter: Don't think of this as a pilothouse. You can do a small hardtop cantilevered back from the windscreen as in the Surtees 540 workmate. https://www.surteesboats.com/our-range/boat/540-hardtop

You could also have a little t-top or half tower either framed plywood, foam and glass or metal framed canvas.

I am building my cabin with an open top, going a little further forward than plans and with a hardtop sunshade above. The hardtop will be from a single sheet of 6mm plywood 1.9m above the sole supported by beams from the dual consoles. Worth it in my view. If I ever need to fully enclose it, I will use canvas and clears. It will negatively affect the look of the boat.

The P19 has a much better design for what you propose but is a bigger boat overall.




As to CNC kits I've not been able to use one as I am in NZ, but cutting the panels by hand is not that hard. You will lose a bit of accuracy and there's a little more work required to get the jig level, but it's no dealbreaker. If you have more money than time, and will build the boat exactly as planned, then a kit is probably worth it.

Again, I'd suggest that you start with a kayak or canoe if you have any use for one.

mizzenman
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Re: General CNC Kit Question

Post by mizzenman »

As for the question "is it like Ikea furniture assembly" In many ways yes. BUT (there's always a but) dealing with fiberglass and epoxy does take some practice to get good at. When I was new I made mistakes like mixing up too much and having a lot of waste, Not getting it out of the cup quick enough and it goes off, not adding enough thickener and it sagged and was a pain to clean up, getting glass strings tangled everywhere, not having everything prepared and ready before mixing epoxy, etc. There's a lot of techniques to learn when using epoxy. Judging thicknesses, using masking tape to cover a big vertical fill to prevent sag, cutting, labeling and organizing all your pieces of glass before you mix, pouring out as much material as possible and NOT working out of a cup even just pouring it into a tray will buy time as does pre-cooling your epoxy if you are working in a hot place... etc. BoatWorksToday is a good youtube channel for learning these techniques. Learning about fillers is another can of worms. You have different fillers for different jobs, like light weight, easy-to-sand, fairing fillers verse hard structural fillers you want to avoid sanding as much as possible. One extra tip I will give you, et al., is the cost savings of flour. Like bake a cake plain flour for thickening. It costs 50 cents a pound compared to $30-50/lb or more for west system fillers. Flour gives you soft-wood like properties, though slightly harder to sand. I will add some west 404 to make it stronger/harder for more structural applications, but to use 100% west system fillers is just throwing money down the drain IMO. Though it certainly will work. I do use commercial marine light weight fillers (eg west 407 or 410) for fairing compound as I have not found a cheap alternative that is easy to sand. Anyone on here know of a cheap additive to replace light weight fairing filler?? How easy is Talc filler to sand?? I haven't tried that yet, but have heard it can be used for fairing? Oh, Don't use flour to thicken epoxy that will be in constant contact with water (like don't use it for filling a dent in a lead keel from hitting a rock) but if you are glassing over it, like when filleting your stitched panels, I've had no issues using flour-epoxy 'glue'.
best of luck

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