took out a pair of slabs of lead.
Apart from changing places, the great excitement was caused by Wally, who eventually realised that he was towing the start line buoy, when he had completed the first lap. He stopped sailing to free himself and thus shortened the second lap for everybody and the first lap for those following him. He did not sail a penalty turn as he had not touched the buoy itself, just the rope work.
The Paddling Race (two anticlockwise laps, the shortest leg on lap one to be paddled, with sails at the entrant's discretion)
This was not so popular despite the fact that Wally had inadvertently shortened the paddling section. Andy was the last to enter the paddling leg and yet was first to finish it. A really good effort and if I had been quicker witted I would have awarded him the engraved paddle. Keith won by a respectable margin.
Fibreglass Scrim, A Useful Prototype Material (WarinK)
When I decided to rig my Kirton kayak for sailing, I wanted to make all the extra fittings in fibreglass. A visit to the Plymouth branch of Scott Bader, who stock all materials for working with fibreglass, produced a versatile foam material called scrim. This comes in sheets about a metre square bonded to a loose weave material on one side. The foam is cut into small squares about 25mm x 25mm, and is 6mm thick. It can be folded in one direction - material inside - and formed to a radius in the other direction. It is easy to cut and can be sanded. The version of the material I used was old stock. The newer version has smaller squares.
I found it was easy to form items without a mould. Curved shapes could be formed over temporary patterns or draped to a natural curve between supports. To avoid adhesion I used a thin plastic film material as a separating layer.
My basic method of manufacture was to mock up the item in thin cardboard on the canoe then, using this as a template, mark up the sheet of scrim and cut out the shape with a Stanley knife, repeating this for the number of thicknesses required. Then I roughly cut out some lengths of fibreglass cloth to suit. One for each layer plus one for the final face. The cloth was cut oversize as it tends to distort when resin is applied. I used 2oz cloth.
For a flat item such as a rudder or leeboard, I laid plastic film direct on the bench then put the first thickness of scrim on top. I used the West resin system with their white pigment added to give the finish colour. To give maximum penetration into the joints and foam the first layer of resin was not thickened with any fillers. The resin was poured on and worked in, then a layer of cloth was laid over and wetted out with more resin, another layer of scrim added, wetted out, more cloth and so on till the required thickness was achieved.
Once the resin has set you have a rigid lamination, which can be trimmed and shaped using a Surform, files, or sandpaper. Holes were filled with thickened resin. I then applied the outer layers of cloth, one side at a time, trimmed them up, then applied further coats of resin to give a finish. Radiused edges are the most difficult areas; I found that these involved many applications of thickened resin and much sanding. Curved forms are built up in the same way, they just need to be
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