Aka Progress

The last couple of days have been slow progress on the akas. I did my first scarfs of the top and bottom beams.  This was interesting because it was my first scarf of this type ever.  Added to that, I had to deal with minor issues of the scarf being near a curve and the fact that the two pieces were not exactly the same size.  The lamination had to be greater or equal to 18 mm thick.  I had to make them slightly oversize to insure this.  Given that they had a curve, the was not real way to plane them back to 18mm.

Close up of glue up. Laminated fir is closer, plywood in the background.

Longer picture.

Scarf after cleanup.

I have also started gluing up blocks for internal reinforcement where the aka attaches to the main hull. These need to be 58mm thick.  I have been using plywood scrap and gluing 90/90 to the outer grain. Paul told me that the components should be cut out so that the grain is oriented 45/45 to the load on the aka.  In other words, there would be Xs along the sides of the aka like trusses on a bridge.

The glue ups are pretty ugly.

When you start cleaning them up, they look a little better.

Task time: 7 hours (last 2 days)
Total project time: 133 hours