Main Hull
The general idea for the manufacturing plan of the main hull is to cut out profiles of the boat to use as guides to sand down a foam mold. After the foam is sanded to shape, a fiberglass layup is done on the mold. Once the layup is complete, the fiberglass is then denibbed and lightly sanded before applying a light body filler. The body filler is then thoroughly sanded down, and then the foam is removed from the fiberglass. Wooden ribs are inserted for structural support and the wooden hull top is secured to the top of the boat. A white gel coat is applied to the hull for a clean finish.
CAD of Main Hull with Ribs:
We first glued together several blocks of foam and cut the big block roughly to size: 56in length, 12in width, and 8in depth (note: target dimensions are 54in length, 10in width, and 8in depth):
We then cut the side, top, and front profiles out of cardboard:
We then put the profiles on the foam block and marked them out with a sharpie:
We could first cut out larger chunks of foam with a saw before moving to the belt sander:
We used the outside of the cut out of the ribs to check with the side curvature:
The final mold, fully sanded down:
A non perforated release film is then wrapped around the mold to prevent the mold sticking to the fiberglass:
3 layers of fiberglass pieces cut out. Before the fiberglass is applied we also put on a release fabric:
How it looked directly after the layup (note: blue tape is over the mold, it was used to minimize wrinkles in the unperforated release film, and the black marks are sharpie outlines from the fiberglass):
Fiberglass is denibbed with a dremel (removing excess fiberglass from the top):
How it looks after denibbing:
The fiberglass had some ripples in it, so we applied a light body filler to the surface to try and even out the gaps between the ripples:
This was then sanded down:
Amas(Side Hulls)
The manufacturing method for the amas are similar to that of the main hull. We sanded down two blocks of foam to shape, and then did a fiberglass layup over the foam mold. The difference for the amas is that we do not need to take out the foam, so we do need to add a release film or release fabric. The thruster mount will be screwed into the amas, so a wooden board on the bottom was added. There is another wooden board on the top so the ama arms can be screwed into the amas.
