Re: Thunder Craft Model 160
Thanks for the compliments, its been allot of work and allot of fun.
You mentioned that the bow seats are connected to the cap of the boat. Is the floor (deck) between the seats also part of the cap? If it is, this means the deck plywood will have to be high enough in the hull to meet the bottom of bow seat area. I suggest you remove all of the old deck up to the point where the bow seats start. This will help you determine how high to set the new deck in the hull. It also important to maintain the rise of the stringers and deck from the transom to the bow. If you build the stringers flat in relation to the keel the deck will not sit level as the boat floats in the water. The deck should rise slightly from stern to bow because when the boat is sitting still in the water the bottom of the boat sits lower in the front than the back.
Can you tell that the stringers are wider at the bow and narrower at the stern?
To shape the stringers I first cut the plywood oversize and glued all the pieces together before cutting them to shape. They are made of two layers of 3/4 plywood laminated together. I then used string lines taped to the hull to represent the finished deck height inside the hull. I took measurements from the string down to where the bottom of the stringer meets the hull. I subtracted 1" from those measurements to allow for the thickness of the stringer bedding, the fiberglass thickness on top of the stringer, the thickness of the plywood deck and the thickness of the fiberglass on top of the deck. This gave me the measurement of the stringer. I took measurements all along the stringer's length to give me the proper profile and transferred those measurements to the laminated stringers. You will have to do some fitting to make them sit the way you want. Each stringer came in and out many times to get them to fit properly.
I used tempered hardboard as template for the deck before cutting it out. It is like pegboard without the holes. You can get it from Home Depot for about $6 a sheet. I suggest you use it for the stringers also. It just did not occur to me to use it when I was building them. It is stiff and easy to cut.
To shape the deck I first rough cut a piece of hardboard oversized. I then marked a centerline on it. Back at the hull I took measurements at 6 inch intervals where the deck meets the sides of the hull. I then transferred those measurements to the template board at the same 6 inch interval along its length setting the marks from center.
The trick is to take all your measurements from center because the hull will not have an exact shape. confused? :redface: I am.
drewp
Btw- I am sure there is a formula that can be used to measure these shapes. I would not really matter if I knew them, I'm lousy at math.
