RivetBangers.com

...said in the best Arnold Schwartzenager voice possible!

I the past week I have taken a hiatus from airplane building in case you were wondering about my absence. My 16' fiberglass center console boat's deck has been getting kinda punky and it needed a "redo" in order to be seaworthy for the open ocean. With striper season FAST approaching, I needed to do something about it.

I figured this would also be a good opportunity to try my hand at 'glassing, as sooner or later I will need these skills for the plane.

Now, TWO gallons of resin into it... things are shaping up! I have been working on the boat for one solid week and am in the finishing stages of the rebuild!!! This was a real learning experience and something I felt like I "needed" to do for several reasons. All in all, I will end up with a boat better than when it rolled out of the plant in Warwick, RI 23 years ago! It has a nice fresh Y2K engine and should last me many more years. I am expecting at least 20.

I intentionally took NO progress pics, as I don't wish to chronicle the process, but I will post up some "after" pics soon!

CJ

BTW, Today I contacted Glasair and ordered some info on the Sportsman 2+2! Really, I did! Gotta keep looking ahead!

To continue your theme -- "I need your boots, your clothes and your motorcycle." Fade in George Thorogood's Bad To The Bone.

I told you glass work wasn't so bad. Just make sure you protect yourself from the resin and the dust when you go to sand, and you will be fine.

The nice thing about glass is it is easy to tell it what to do. Shaping metal on the other hand requires some serious skill.

Hey are you going to the Nashua aviation expo tomorrow? There are some neat courses, so I think I will fly down.

Antony

AWESOME!!! can't wait for the after pics!! brittne and i would love to have a boat, and we would if we had someplace to put it on the water and use it. maybe someday...

There is an interesting thread on VAF website about the poor quality of Van's fiberglass. I am not there yet, but seems like a lot of people that are, are having a problem with the quality. Maybe folks around here would like to add comments. I voted to gather the comments and forward them to Van's.

(hey Chad, Normal, Ill? I'm an old Saluki).

gbrasch wrote:(hey Chad, Normal, Ill? I'm an old Saluki).

well, what the heck brought you to AZ? the sun? the climate? low humidity? the great flying weather?

gbrasch wrote:There is an interesting thread on VAF website about the poor quality of Van's fiberglass. I am not there yet, but seems like a lot of people that are, are having a problem with the quality. Maybe folks around here would like to add comments. I voted to gather the comments and forward them to Van's.

i have a friend who is using the sam james cowl for his -7 rotary. i've checked it out, and it seems to be pretty good quality. they are within $100 of each other (SJ being higher), but i plan to use a james cowl regardless of the engine i put in. looks better too!

Good flying weather out here Chad, and I got tired of snow..........

The Van's fairing for my horizonatal & vertical Stablizer for the RV-6A appeared to be desgined for another airplane. I had to modify it several ways and it will still need some work before painting.

However the gear leg fairings for the main gear and wheel pants couldn't have been better. A better builder would have helped but the quaility was excellant. I have been putting the cowling on now and the quaility of the cowls was unbeliveably great. However I am still having problems with the stupid builder! I hope to finishe the side hinges of the upper cowl 4/24/06. The I just have to exopy the air inlet upper fairings to the inside of the cowl and those are good. If I could only get a smarter builder it sure would help!!

...thinking about the quality of Van's fiberglass parts, the issue of fitment seems to be the worst gripe, I think.

The empennage parts are crude, for sure! I suppose this is another place they leave it open to the builder's own methods. Everyone has a different idea and some ideas require significantly changing the fiberglass component.

I am not ready to even consider fitment of the wingtips, but I do hope they fit better than the emp tips!

CJ