Frame Alignment and Centerline

Placing the frames at the exact interval and obtaining a perfect alignment was not difficult but required a lot of care.

Checking the distance between frames and from BH B. Then we blocked the frame supports to the strongback with bolts.

But at the end the measurements where within millimetric tolerance

Now it is time fro the centerline

 This is a boat!

Frames on Strongback Pt 2

All the frames go up very quickly.

We had only a problem with frame D where the width of the vertical supports was narrower than the strongback size. A little bit of cutting with the plasma adjusted everything.

To complete the job we have to place the bulkheads. We opened a hatch on BH B. The placing of the flange caused a bi

t of distortion of the frame that needs to be corrected.

Ant then bulkhead H

Frames on Strongback

The strongback basement is finished. It will need some more reinforcement that we shall do when frames will be up.
We payed a lot of attention to build the strongback with proper alignment

Before setting up the frames we have to correct the slots in the frames. The original specification by Robert for stringers was 50x30 but now we found out that we got 50x50. We need to enlarge the slots by 2cm.
This will be done with a plasma cutter.

On frames A,C,J and transom we will cut 1 cm on each side. On all others 2 cm on the bottom side. This will preserve the convergence of the stringers, or so we wish.

Now the first frame goes on. Very emotional step.

Very quickly the others now follow

Now it starts showing its shape!

StrongBack

Today we will finish the basement.

After cutting the pieces according to drawings we started aligning them on the floor.

And then waited for the train to come.

Now is time to place the legs

After raising it at 180cm height

Preparing for the Strongback

The frames have been completed and piled on one side.
Their size is really impressive

A little more work has to be done on bulkheads

On BH B we opened a 50x50 cm hatch for access to the anchor locker and placed vertical reinforcements with a 40x40x4 Angle 6082 Alu.

And on BH K the same vertical reinforcements

We then wanted to tack the bathing platform just to have a piece that looked as a boat and believe we were sitting on the platform with feet hanging down in a blue water lagoon.

The result is that we found out that it does not fit as expected. We probably will need to reshape it later. So far so good.


Now we start preparing for the next phase. Setting up the strongback.
The space was cleaned and room made for the basement.

We decided to build the strongback in pieces of 150mm thick iron hold together by 10mm bolts.
This will make it easier to remove it at the time of turning the hull. There will be no need to cut iron and thus no contamination of the alu at a point when it would be very difficult to remove the iron particles.

Frame Distorsion

To check that no twist occurred on frames while welding flanges we used a laser level

 And then checked again on the lofting floor

Flanges Bending Flanges....

We found a way to make S shape curves

Bending on a shape with the desired radius

Good but at this point we found out that we placed the horizontal bar on the wrong side of few frames. So we had to reposition them.

Flanges

All frames have been completed. There is a bunch of them piled up in a corner of the shop.

It is a great satisfaction. An with no welding distorsion untill now.

To achieve the best quality possible, we asked for a RINA certification of our weldings.
Here is the inspector checking our work

Now we can boldly go on with the flanges
The 6082 T6 alloy is much more strong then the 5083 used untill now and difficult do bend.

Still very difficult to obtain the desired radius.

So we go on with frame A

Finally it is completed. Continuous welding on both sides at corners +50mm. Chain welding 75+150 both sides

Then we continued with frame C. A little bit more complex.

So to make all  different turns we went back to manual bending

We hope to complete the flanges in few days. We can't wait to see the skeleton on the strongback.