Fairbody

The Fairbody is the joint at the bottom of the boat.  Chris cuts out 2 pieces according to the plan.

Using plastic zip ties, he joins the two pieces through the drilled holes. 

Then he opens it up and uses the stand he's built to hold it open at the correct angle, forming the curve at the front.

Next he epoxies the seam except for the parts with zip ties and lets it dry. When dry, the epoxy is strong enough that the zip ties can be removed and the holes filled in.

He uses the stringers to hold it down. They are not attached yet, they are just set on there.  Then he fills in the whole seam with epoxy and a strip of fiberglass fabric.

Next up: attaching the chine shelves!

Scarfing Plywood

Chris is using marine grade meranti plywood to build his boat.

Like standard plywood, it comes in 4 foot by 8 foot sheets. To get the long planks needed for his boat pieces, Chris joined the plywood together in a process called scarfing.

First, Chris cut the last few inches of plywood sheets down at an angle of about 8%. He used a special jig made for his circular saw to do this. (It may have involved removing the safety guard on the saw. Don't try this at home.)  This is how it looked:

Then he overlapped both ends with epoxy in the middle and screwed it to his shop floor until the epoxy dried.

Remove the screws and voila! you have longer sheets of plywood!  The epoxy is strong enough that the joints are stronger that the wood itself.  A good thing, since that will be what holds the entire boat together.

Chris sanded off the excess to make the whole thing nice and smooth.