Stories about boats and waterways
Honestly, it’s nearly done, I swear, but Twiggy’s bottom needed a final layer of fibreglass to bump it up a bit, as well as some chopped strand mat around the corners, then a load of filler to join up all the gaps. This was filmed over two trips and with a very windy day, lead to much swearing (which I have bleeped, for your delicate ears)
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It’s an event that few thought would ever happen but I have finally applied three (so far) sheets of 1708 biaxial fibreglass over the back of my project boat, Twiggy, and this video documents that sticky process, using Atlac 580 vinylester resin.
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For those who thought this day would never come, prepare to have your world shaken to the core – I have finally slapped resin all over the new wood core for Twiggy’s transom, and pushed it into place on the back of the boat. Now I just need to fibreglass over the top of it.
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Having not been able to do any restoration work on my cabin cruiser Twiggy for a while, I finally got back to the boatyard to do final preparation before fitting the new transom core. This involved a bit more fibreglass work as well as mixing up thickened resin to seal the join between the top and bottom halves of the hull, which were coming apart.
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After a long period where it seemed that all I did was make holes in my fibreglass cabin cruiser, “Twiggy”, I have at least started to repair them.
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In order to fix the holes in the sides of my boat that I made when trying to find out where the transom wood ended, I need to open them out a bit so as to give me a space onto which to stick new fibreglass so that meant buying an angle grinder and making the holes even bigger. Don’t worry, it’s all part of the plan.
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I did my first proper check on my fibreglass cabin cruiser “Twiggy” since I left it for winter and although it was too full of condensation to do any sanding, I set about taking off some soggy wood from the roof with the multitool. Inevitably, chaos followed.
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This is part 4 of my complete transom rebuild. In this thrilling episode, I place reinforcing glass fibre into the inner skin of the transom using vinylester resin. And I get buzzed by a hornet (maybe).
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Having removed all the rotten transom wood (see the prior videos in my ‘Twiggy transom’ playlist, link below), I now needed to patch a couple of holes on the inner fibreglass skin. This video documents that process.
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Although traditional steel narrowboats cost many thousands of pounds, even second-hand, there is a cheaper and easier way to get a foot on the water and that’s with a fibreglass cabin cruiser. In this video, I visit a woman who’s chosen exactly that as her first boat.
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