Boat building: Stiffening a plywood hatch cover -- I don't want it to flex.

[Steve Sanford]

Very intuitive RM, are you psychic? You are actually correct, I do have a receiver hitch of sorts under the deck!

I'll go into more detail, later in my build thread because there is actually a cool story behind the construction of the bollard.

But briefly — I found an off-cut of aluminium square tube in our scrap pile which happened to be the perfect sleeve for the bollard. Later when I’m ready to mount the bollard I’ll pour in some epoxy to glue it in. It would have been too complicated to glass the bollard into the anchor well once the deck was on, and I wouldn’t have been able to already paint the well which was much easier while it was open.

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Matthias~

I been thoroughly enjoying this thread - appreciating your fine craftsmanship and creativity. Great work all around on a sweet vessel!

BTW: As you have already shown - doing as much as you can BEFORE the decks are on is a very important "rule" in any build. (Yes, I learned this the hard way....)

re Bollard. I would bore a drain hole in the bottom of the "receiver" - just in case. And, I would bed the bollard in 3M 5200 instead of epoxy, especially where it passes through the deck. The pliability at a joint that will get lots of stress on it should wear longer than a brittle adhesive - at least in my experience (more of my seat-of-the-pants engineering).

Congratulations once again!

SJS

 

[Matthias]

Matthias~

I been thoroughly enjoying this thread - appreciating your fine craftsmanship and creativity. Great work all around on a sweet vessel!

BTW: As you have already shown - doing as much as you can BEFORE the decks are on is a very important "rule" in any build. (Yes, I learned this the hard way....)

re Bollard. I would bore a drain hole in the bottom of the "receiver" - just in case. And, I would bed the bollard in 3M 5200 instead of epoxy, especially where it passes through the deck. The pliability at a joint that will get lots of stress on it should wear longer than a brittle adhesive - at least in my experience (more of my seat-of-the-pants engineering).

Congratulations once again!

SJS

Excellent, I’m happy that you are enjoying the thread. And thanks for your input Steve.

About the bollard
I was hoping that the bollard would act as a post to add some rigid support to the deck.

Thinking about the “receiver” now, ideally it should have been longer so that the deck rests on it, but at the time of construction, I thought of it’s purpose to be an inch-high flange at the base of the bollard to tie it to the anchor well floor. Then, just before I cut the tubing I changed my mind and made it taller so that I could engrave a message into it.



To tie the bollard in at the top of the deck, I had planned to make a plywood collar/flange to act as a buttress. I was then going to fillet and glass the bollard in so that it became a rigid integral part of the boat. In my mind it was always going to be rigid and the deck hole was cut as a firm fit to help in that regard.



You’ve thrown a bit of a spanner in the works with the suggestion of not rigidly mounting the bollard — I’ll have to have a think about that.

 

[RM Anderson]

Matthias,
Perhaps you could put the collar under the deck and retain the function of interchangeability. That way your receiver could act as a bollard or perhaps a mount for spot/flood light or even a winch. When my Kara Hummer needed a spud hole through the deck I did it in this manner:

 

[Matthias]

Matthias,
Perhaps you could put the collar under the deck and retain the function of interchangeability. That way your receiver could act as a bollard or perhaps a mount for spot/flood light or even a winch. When my Kara Hummer needed a spud hole through the deck I did it in this manner:

Damn, that’s nice! Too bad you didn’t show me this 2 months ago!
I don’t think think I want to re-engineer the bollard at this point. When I first started building I was happy just to build the Cackler straight up as per Sam’s plan, but the more l learned, the more pictures I looked at my vision for the build started to change. If I add every desire the build will never finish. I’m at the point now after starting one year ago where I just want the thing done.

I’m going to add it to the list for the next boat which includes reverse chines, mini swim deck/steps, poling platform and a side console!

 

[RM Anderson]

Matthias,
If you are my age, this is where you start to ask yourself, "What would I do with my life if I had to do it all over again?" I'm happy you are having fun; your enthusiasm is infectious!
RM