Team Seacats

Last night I ended up helping a friend in desperation who’s air conditioner compressor quit working that afternoon.  We put a new one in and got his a/c up and running for the hot day we had today!  David brought beer so I didn’t get much else done.

Tonight, however, I started by cleaning up the one face of the rudder mold, brushing away the clay in the seams and washing away the PVA.  I hot-glued my plastic fence at the trailing edge of the rudder (more on that once I separate the mold).  Pictures are still from the camera phone – so the quality leaves a little to be desired.  The replacement charger should be here next week for our camera.

Once that was done, I waxed the new face three times with the mold release wax (designed to be used with the same brand of PVA) and shot three or four coats of PVA on the plug.  Once the last coat of PVA dried (30 minutes or so), I mixed up some gelocat and brushed it on using a disposable chip brush this time instead of one of the foamies…it worked a little better.  Again, still not as nice as spraying it, but there’s MUCH less cleanup.

Once the gelcoat was given about 30 to 45 minutes to firm up and be tacky, next came the thickened resin with milled fiberglass and some microballoons for good consistency.  The milled glass fibers make a very dense (and heavy) filler but they can make it too dry by the time you get the thickness right.  Getting it about halfway there with the glass fibers and finish with microballoons makes a very workable mixture.  Colloidal Silica would be the preferable filler but I don’t have any at the moment.  I put the filler in the alignment holes and on the sharp edge of the fence so the fiberglass won’t have to make any sharp bends and not bond well.

After that, I put two layers of 3.5oz satin weave cloth on (to reduce print-through into the mold surface) followed by about 7 or 8 layers of 5 oz cloth – some layers at 45 degrees to the next.  It’s curing now and should be ready to perhaps attempt a separation in the morning (if I get up early enough before work). If everything went well, I should be able to mold up a real rudder over the next couple of evenings.