16 Sep 22:
Today we glued the rudder cheeks to the rudder blade using TotalBoat THIXO Flex, a flexible thickened epoxy. Thickened epoxy fills joints better than straight epoxy, and the Flex is formulated for movement of materials used in the marine environment. Light clamp pressure was used, only enough to see a good seam with epoxy beginning to squeeze out. No squeeze out could mean not enough epoxy was applied, so keep plastic syringes handy to inject epoxy as needed. Too much clamp pressure can force most of the epoxy out of the joint, and there will be poor adhesion.
Video: https://youtu.be/rI1WMXfSXg8
Tiller profile was taken from the plans, transferred to a scrap of teak and cut out with a DeWALT 20V jigsaw.
The rudder head measured 7/8 inches thick, and we want to make the tiller the same thickness...
...so we rolled out the DeWalt 13 inch planer to thin the tiller. We took off about 1/8 inches of thickness, 1/64th inch per pass, flipping the tiller each time.
We ran out of Kirby Primer, and we prefer to stick with the same line of thinner, primer, fairing compounds, epoxy, paint etc when we can. So TotalBoat Topside Primer was called into action for the rudder. It is a good primer, covers well and we have found it will work with Kirby Paint.
We also had cut out the two tiller straps from 1/4 inch marine grade plywood. The straps and the tiller got a coat of TotalBoat Gleam Satin varnish.
