There is about 1 hour worth of clean up on the keelson edge for the ply sheets to attach to.  The transition from rabbet to lap is going to be tricky and the bow section had a bit of misalignment in Z that I am fighting.  Decided to cut it down about 3 mm to get the profile to match the section profiles otherwise the surface will go flat or cup in right near the keelson.  The shear ledge board (name??)  is fitted at the transom and stem and the overall length came in dead on.  These boards will remain unattached at both ends and not glued during the skin job.  They have been screwed to the mould form all along.  I am considering burying the first ply layer in the bow area with a rabbet between stem and section 1.  I think I will hold that off until the ply pieces approach the stem then cut it in place.  Not easy or easy to bomb!  Time to pick up the ply sheets and get the show rolling.

Cleaning up the details, they just don't end.  Attached transom to mold and adjusted mold profile with shims under each batten to match the transom profile wedge.  Fitted shear to transom and now moving back to stem to fit that intersection.  Thinking of gluing gussets along the length of the shear to hold it in place at each station.

Thanks Richard, these clamps are great!!

This is almost ready now but will need to add a wedge shaped strip along the flange to match the mold profile.  I chickened out on making a 6 mm outer face supported by the ribbing.  It probably does not save much on weight but I did not want to cut up that large an area out of solid wood.  On the plus side the face and flange edge provide a stair-step interface for the two layers of the hull to contact with.  I used 5 #4 brass screws in this assembly.  Need to see if that is safe to leave in place or if they might create problems down the line.

Transom work started.  The baseline reference is offset 38 mm from back panel of mold assembly. The transom will consist of a web structure of thin ply with the outer face 9 mm thick.

Back in mold and, trued up, re-leveled and marked.   Ready for remove and more shaping.

Shaping of keelson.  Started a first rough in of the keel shape and it is ready to go back in the mold and recheck the rabbits or landings.  The leveling of the keel within the mold is likely but it should be close with the previous shims.

Next time need to level keelson before putting in all the battens.  Knew it would be a problem but ignored the thought.  Little helpers set shims and wedges at each station and tuned in the offset from the baseline.  Most are within <3 mm but the 8-7-6 stations again were troublesome.  Unfortunately there is a bit of stress in the keelson laminate as it is clamped in the form.  More tuning has slowly arrived at a good compromise.  I switched the baseline to mono-filament line, aligned the laser to the form then found the keelson center-line dead on.  The mono-filament was aligned with that and heights taken starting with 381 mm at transom and 851 mm at stem.  

Now the height tuning has really only taken 2-3 hours.  After discovering some twist that was removed a line was transferred from the batten form to the edge of the laminate.  The laminate has been removed and is ready for some initial planing / sawing.  No progress on transom assembly but hope to start cutting that up next week.  Once the keelson is cut up a bit it goes back and re tuned to the form for a finer planing then I will let the router loose on the skin joint and see where we are,

More tweaks

Finished battens installation.  The Transom / station 8 transition is problematic and will take some time to get fare.  Might be possible to start chipping on the keelson by the weekend.  The actual transom will be built up like a cell structure with marine ply with a thin wall.

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Discovered station 7 mould was all messed up at several loft points.  Removed mould, modified and reinserted.  Now the real FF15 shape is in place.  CAD drawing must be a curve fit issue.

Marine ply has arrived and keelson routing is about to begin.  Seems like the coldmould form will work well for router guide to cut much of the keelson rabbit.
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The peculiar shape in the aft area of the hull that I have seen in the loft lines and the construction of the keelson.  Between stations 6 and 8 the hull surface is concave.  IS THIS RIGHT?  You can see it in the battens adjacent to the keel or in the schematic showing the gap compared to an arc.  I suppose FF sailors don't spend too much time rubbing their boats underbelly but if you happen to know and this looks normal please let me know.  Thanks.

This picture shows the transom station at the picture bottom then station 8.  Beyond that the battens sink to station 7 then back up to 6.











I am wishing now I had perhaps skipped on using the plywood for mould forms.  I will probably have to attach blocks of wood fore and aft of these stations to get more reliable attachment points.  So far not to bad but the stem is going to be a bit of a sculpting job.


Meanwhile somewhere out in the Pacific a stack of marine ply is headed this way from Seattle.  I expect a call from the docks anytime soon then some hokus pokus on finding a place to put it.

This shows a first fitting of the keelson within the moulds.  Just a small bit of trimming needed.  This will be set accurately in place once a set of battens are fitted up to make the true inner hull surface.  Time to make lots of battens.

Shifting gears a bit and planning to cut keelson while it is sitting in the molds and battens that form the cold mold profile.  Checking the keelson with laser it is pretty tight with a small 3/8" skew at the stem.  The stem has quite a bit of meat on it so there should be no problem sculpting it out.  Flipped the keel over and rechecked the laser line and double checked with a tool to mark the top and bottom center. 

There are some obvious oops in the lamination, basically too much wood that will be cutoff anyway.  The 3-4-5 station areas are looking good and flow easily from fore and aft.  Lots of routing though, probably get kicked out of the neighborhood.

Did some tune up on the base and bolstered the ends, added straight line and set square marks normal to it at each station.   The transom location is approximate but lots of room to work with.  Raised baseline 11/16 inch so the molds will ride above the line and tape.  Started fitting molds, work goes fast, spacing is easy and accurate so thinking about fabricating the long battens, stringers, whatever they are called that go over the molds and which the strips get laid out on for the hull. 

 Had the keel jig sections reset on keel to mark off all the station lines.  This helped out a bit.  I think now these can be taken apart to wood or scrap.