Monthly Archives: June 2015

Bond Lines in Adhesive Bonded Structures

Understanding Bond Line Stresses in Composites

By Jeff Wright — Vice President of Technical Services

This article will discuss some of the engineering aspects to consider when designing or repairing an adhesive bonded composite structure, particularly bond line stresses. Fiberglass reinforced plastic and other composites influence the design of many products manufactured today. Boat hulls, sports equipment and airplanes can easily take new, complex shapes when composites are used in place of traditional materials. Reinforcing structures also benefit from the versatility of composite materials when prefabricated components are bonded with a high-strength adhesive. Continue reading →

Foam Strip Plank Boatbuilding

BY JOHN LINDAHL

A couple of years ago my son Ian asked me about building an A Class catamaran. Having built several of these in the past and knowing what was now on the market, I came up with a build method that would:

Allow us to build a competitive design.
Be at or under the class minimum weight of 165 lb.
Be as strong and stiff as anything on the market.
Be competitive in quality and price, but not get trapped in exotic equipment expense. This meant no vacuum bag, no pre-preg, no resin infusion, and no autoclave.

Continue reading →

White Oak Redux

by Bruce Niederer and Bill Bertelsen

Building stuff, especially boats, with wood is much like a religious calling; once you hear the call, there’s no turning back. Those who’ve heard the call will not suffer fools willingly, so when I decided to conduct some white oak adhesion and shear testing and report the results in Epoxyworks 31, skeptics and believers alike took to the internet wooden boat forums-and had no problem speaking their minds! Having healed from the pummeling I took in some quarters, I’m back again to report the promised follow-up test results. Continue reading →

Construction of a Custom Lantern Post

By Donald Stevens

Having thought about constructing a nice custom lantern post for many years, I was inspired when I read an article in Woodenboat Magazine about building hollow spars with “bird’s mouth” joints. Having a pile of red cedar drops from other projects I came up with the design of using two staved sections connected by a turned collar of the same material.

Continue reading →

New Boat Repair Kits

New for 2012, WEST SYSTEM is offering three specialized boat repair kits designed with the do-it-yourselfer in mind. Each contains the right materials and instructions for making lasting repairs and is available at your local stocking WEST SYSTEM dealer. Continue reading →

Outdoor Sculpture Sculptor

A Little Less Than Meets The Eye is a 9′ x 7′ x 6′, Fiberglass and polished aluminum sculpture installed at Raleigh, North Carolina, Art on City Plaza.

by Mike Barker

Bill Wood has been making sculptures since high school. He has a degree in Art from Ottawa University, Ottawa, Kansas and attended the Kansas City Art Institute, Kansas City, Missouri. His work has been featured in shows from Connecticut to Key West and as far west as Topeka Kansas. Continue reading →

Jan Gougeon Launches STRINGS

By Grace Ombry

Cover Photo: On July 9, 2011, the 40′ catamaran STRINGS was launched at the Gougeon Brothers boat shop on the Saginaw River in Bay City, Michigan.

Jan Gougeon’s monumental launch of STRINGS occurred in July of 2011, over a decade after the birth of the project. Jan passed away on December 18, 2012. We miss him. —ED

In Epoxyworks 17, we published a photo with the following caption: In the recess of the Gougeon boat shop loft, something unusual is taking shape out of plywood, foam, carbon fiber, and epoxy. There is a minimum of plans and drawings. It evolves, piece by piece, mostly from its creator’s head. It’s not a trimaran. Not exactly a catamaran. Technical you probably wouldn’t call this a hull. It’s more of a fuselage. (There is an aircraft canopy involved.) For now, let’s call it Project J. We’ll keep an eye on this project in coming issues and see what develops. Continue reading →

Sanding Tricks of the Trade

By Damian McLaughlin

All of the boat builders that I know have little sanding tricks that make a job go faster or do it better. Fairing a 40′ custom-built hull is an arduous task that is often accomplished with two-man teams and fairing boards. We do 90% of the work with a grinding device. Almost everyone in the business will agree that a grinder will remove a substantial amount of material quickly. The trick is controlling that removal. Continue reading →

Soundproofing a Generator

By Ted Wasserman

For soundproofing a generator, I built an enclosure with 2 lb lead sheet sandwiched between 24 oz double-biased stitched mat using WEST SYSTEM® Epoxy. The thickness of the enclosure is 1/16” and has a mass of approximately 2 lb per square foot. Continue reading →

Fiberglassing Strip-Planked Boats

Lesson 2 in our series on Strip Planking

by Ted Moores

At the La Routa Maya canoe race in Belize, SA., we saw a natural progression from chopping canoes out of logs to fiberglassing strip-planked boats with WEST SYSTEM® Epoxy. Strip-planking may have been the first step after the dugout in the evolution of boatbuilding techniques; the way the quality of wood is going, it might be the last to survive. With our strip-planked hull faired and the outside stem attached, there are many techniques that could turn these strips into a boat. Continue reading →