Weekend’s work – half hulls
I am the Bungie King. With wooden fingers.
Bungie chords in different lengths, and with lots of places to hook to, seem to apply the right amount of flexible pressure, over large areas, to pull the strips together snug. Since I plan to finish the insides bright, random staple holes would be unsightly, otherwise you could just use more staples. Also, the bungies ease the strips most of the way flat without breaking them. Bungies with large plastic hooks don’t mar the wood. The wooden fingers, with a spring clamp applied, hold the strips flat against the form. Fast and easy to apply. Problem solved.
The only downside is you have to wait for the glue to set before you can unclamp things and apply another row of strips. Right now, that means about two hours between a full round of strips – one on each side of each hull. So, today I only got 12 strips on in 11 hours. Once I get past the curve of the bilge, and all the strips lie mostly in the same plane, I may be able do two and clamp them together. We’ll see. Otherwise, I’ll just do one row a night ‘til it’s done.
In any case, the clamping system works. Here’s a close up of some finished strip planks.
Here you can see the hollow turn in the bow, where the strips have to twist vertical and dip inward, all in the span of a few inches.
With fifteen strips up the sides of each boat, you get a real sense of the shape of the hull.
And now you can start to see the really fine entry the bow will make, with all it’s complex curves.
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