Doing a bit of carbon fibre lamination

[Torchy]

Here are some photos of Loco's forefoot repair. The trolley had cracked the hull and Loco had sprung a leak.

Tom Slater showed me how to laminate and hopefully this will turn out well.

From previous experience with Tom on similar repairs getting the matting sufficiently wet and using peel ply and cling film to act like vacuum bagging is key.

I'll know how it has turned out tomorrow.

[Torchy]

Reasonably pleased with the result - a little rubbing down and it will be fine.

Next stage will be laminating the board we made at the sticky...a little more daunting

[BenR]

did you laminate that onto the paint?

[Stuberry]

Also, if the boat was leaking through the gap, have you addressed the failure in the core material?

[roland_trim]

Fair gaffa tape, so will probably do a good job.

[Torchy]

Most of the paint was removed and under the repair it is mainly carbon, just not to the edge of the tape. I anticipate rubbing most of it off when we (hopefully) do the re-furb in the autumn. Something needed to be done before Rutland as the tape I had covered it with peeled off when we put the boat back on the trolley at Draycote.

The boat was leaking through the cracks but I think just into the foam. The repair seems as rigid as the hull would have been originally. I can't now make the laminations move.

During the re-furb I was wondering about strengthening that area. Would laminating something inside the tank be a good idea? I can't feel the crack inside but I could measure back from the stem.

...Oh, and I've sorted the trolley out which caused the problem. Just waiting for a bar from Mersea Trailers to do a permanent job on the trolley which appears to have been bodged at some stage.