Buy a Watchmate AIS for Christmas

We probably have just enough time to take the order and have a courier deliver to your address this side of December 25th?

Part of the Vespermarine family.

http://www.vespermarine.com/

The new transponder has WiFi so will speak to your laptop.

How it works!

Vesper Marine have a special offer and will ship for free right now.

You can place your order with CKD Boats cc and pay with your credit card
 via Pay-Pal or a bankers draft.We will do the rest.

Roy

Hard dodger glass fitting

We try each panel fits before shipping, its also a great place to pack the glass panels for safety.

Layed in place, with an allowance all round to take the Dow-Corning glazing silicone we supply with each kit.

These are a free extra, they will make a roof hatch vent if you want to use them, the set on the left is the opening hatch and its mount ring is next to it.

There are five windows and frames, this is the front one.

The starboard side window.

This window frame joins the front window to the rear side windows.

We supply a builders instruction sheet with each kit we sell, in this case we will also do a scale model build so you can see what follows what.

How easy is that?

Roy

A comment from one of our regular blog viewers is below.

Hi Roy,

That really is a brilliant bit of CNC kit cutting, is all that done from that first dog house the you built for the Dix 43 boat, if so then it was well worth doing it. Who does all the drawings for the cutting, I imagine they must be done on something like Acad? It's all very technical.

CNC cutting for the hard dodger kit

This has become a scaled down version of the one made for a 43ft yacht, another was sent down to New Zealand for a boat around 40ft, the new one fits an Erikson 35 Mk2 so becomes a fair bit smaller but the same design principals are much the same. Suitable for both sail and power boats for either home or proffesional fitting.

The roof top jig is an important part of the process, we supply the formers in 16mm MDF and also the 22mm x 22mm hardwood battens to join it all together. The roof is then moulded from two sheets of 4mm marine ply with an 8mm layer of Superform bending ply inside as the core.

The main part of the actual roof support is cut from one sheet of 15mm thick ockume marine ply, its both strong and light. We include a free hatch and support frame, thats it on the far right,two shapes side by side.

Side window, starboard side, all glass recesses are precut and ready for you to drop the glass in.

With the tabs removed and the infill ply taken out we can then place the 6mm toughened  glass in the recess for safe shipping.

This is a side window, the port side.

This kit will be packed and shipped to the USA next week.

Roy

Wooden Mast building glues?

We had a question asked as to why we do not recomend using epoxy on wooden mast builds?

More on this a little later!

Roy

I was asked about an artical I had published but not told which one, it is the one in Duckworths Magazine.

This one    http://www.duckworksmagazine.com/06/howto/birdsmouth/index.htm

from the article in Duckworks magizine  This is the mast stave scarphs being glued. The glue is a special Phenolic Resin. Note! NEVER GLUE UP MASTS WITH EPOXY!

????????????  Why 

Kevin  

We stock Phenolic and Epoxy glues, plus have experience with the use of both of them, they are branded and packed specially for us.

Below is part of a conversation I was having with a customer who bought a Cape Henry 21 kit, we shipped it to Seattle, USA.

The reply is from Dudley Dix.

Regards

Roy

www.ckdboats.com

Cape Town

There is something that I did not mention. Resorcinol's bond to wet wood is infinitely better than that of epoxy. If the wood is saturated then the resorcinol bond increases its hold on the wood, whereas epoxy lets go. That is the main reason why marine plywood must be made with resorcinol.

Regards,

DD

Navigation with a Blackberry Torch 5800

I was advised by a good friend that to use the Blackberry map for sailing and entry into say a narrow bay or river was probably not a great idea? I checked for marine navigation charts and found none for southern africa at all.

The Torch 9800 Blackberry does have access to a GPS and a maping system, you need to read the acceptance rules on the Vodacom map site before it will be down loaded. You also click on Accept to waiver all errors (if any) before you will get the link to the GPS and its map.

What did I find?

Well the harbour road has been wrongly named, the name given is from an estate close by, the name of that estate road is unknown to myself but the road we live in is correct, not a great start?

On the marine side the local Hout Bay Harbour is there but there is an error, its a large one too, a concrete (?) wall closes off the harbour entrance, so there is no way in or out!

My friends advice was really very good.

Thanks Justin.

Roy

Note, Google maps have Northshore Drive un named and Westfort Road is named Westford Road, as we also have a Westford Road down Valley Road in Hout Bay this will cause confusion. At least Google maps have the harbour entrance open!

Glass for a hard dodger

This is specially toughened 6mm thick glass, the customer chose clear for decent night vision but we ordered a light smoked colour to fill the over head opening hatch with.

We also provide the Dow Corning 813 glazing silicone to fasten the glass in with.

All panels are marked so we can be sure the product is safe.

This set will be shipped with the rest of the kit to the USA.


Roy

Epoxy repair of a Hillman Imp engine cylinder top edge

When the Imps top edge on a block fails its normally down to corrosion from lack of additives in the cooling water, the options are to scrap the block or skim it and add a thick shim. I have done the shim method and bonded a 1mm alloy shim in place with epoxy, it worked fine with a normal head gasket on top of the shim.

Click on the picture to enlarge it and see more of the problem.

I am not the first to try and repair this block!

Why bother you may ask? well we have discovered that this Mk1 block is a really early one, being 49 years old its worth reviving we think. The number stamped on the block is 501572, meaning this engine will be number 1572 made.

Here I have used a wood chisel to get down to new metal, then cleaned the surfaces with acetone as recomended by the epoxy makers.

I used the piston as a mould tool, wrapped with tape and a shim of thin white plastic to hold the epoxy in place.

I then packed the inside of the cooling jacket with more thin plastic, mixed the epoxy 50/50 as the instructions require and applied the mix.

The folded strips worked really well but will the epoxy?

I then bolted the cylinder head in place with a strip of  50mm sellotape where the epoxy would be, left the engine in the sun to aid cure time and checked it out around four hours later. Did it work, well time will tell but it looks good to me. 

Cleaned up when the epoxy was still uncured, the plastics came off with some effort but by the next morning the excess epoxy was bonded solid to the green plastic that was inside the water jacket, so early removal is advisable.

The shine on the surface will now be sanded lightly to help the head gasket grip better.

Roy

Epoxy for metal repairs

I have used this in the past, I also know guys in the motor trade who do the same, one mechanic has even repaired engine pistons with it! One piston had a hole in the crown of the piston, another the side skirt was broken, both were fixed with this brand of epoxy and are still running today he told me.

Good for around 320c temperature and 270 kgs per inch of pressure says the packing cover.

You will have to look at the following blog to see what I have repaired with it!

JB Weld, imported from the USA, I bought mine at Midas, Montegue Gardens, Cape Town. About U$20.00 or so.

At R170 a set of tubes, this product is far from cheap but just think about the down time and machine repair costs saved, in some cases we can save a part which is throw away?

Roy

A Pigeon named Henry

Henry grew up with us from a tiny chick, he and his nest fell from a tree and Jean saved his life, when she brought Henry and his nest home one day.

As Henry grew up he bonded with Jean and myself, he was even ok with Druma our dog but Druma was not so sure?

Many got to know our Henry, he would land on your head as a sign of approoval when he liked you.

Henry would come and go as he pleased, he was totally free to do so, we fed him and changed his bed daily, then one day he flew off and we never saw him again, where is Henry now?

Roy

The ARC Around the World 2012 fleet arrives in Hout Bay

Well some of them, said to be 30 yachts this year when the 2010 fleet was just 19? The HBYC will be very happy to welcome the ARC Around The World fleet once more.

I heard this visitor from Japan hail on VHF channel 16, he called  the harbour and asked for permission to enter, Barry off  Drumbeat called him and suggested he come into the marina, pick up a space and find the club marina manager.

Note: Hout Bay has no active harbour master!

Also here is a 40ft Hallberg Rassey with an Island Packet 48.5 on the hard at the HBBY in the far left hand corner of this picture.

Pictures by R McBride

Roy