Having a boat under construction and still having the current boat is both a curse and a blessing in disguise. With bits that need to come off Teknologika to go on Hyperion (the wings) there was always going to be a window of time when the wings needed to be fitted, and the way the schedule is slipping it was looking like it was going to be a couple of races in at the start of the season.

Well ripping my tramp in two has forced me to pull the wings apart anyway so the tubes were thrown in the back of the car and half a day later they are sitting in their future home.

The tramp lacing technique that I have chosen has introduced another challenge in the build and that is attaching the wings without any U bolts as there is no lip at the deck anymore. Instead the wing blocks have nuts embedded in them that you bolt into.

This is the exact method of attachment that Dave has chosen for the Monstro so luckily this is a solved problem. That just needs to be replicated on my boat. And that takes time.

This weekend was spent gluing foam blocks together then sanding cutting and fitting them around the frames that I have producing through the deck. Now that the blocks are in place there is another day or two of work where I embed stainless plates to tap into then wrap the whole thing in a few layers of carbon. Then mould up wing straps.

One thing that I know people will say when they see the wing blocks is “Did they have to be so big?” the answer is yes. The larger the area, the better support the wings will have and the stiffer the wing platform will be, and as this boat has no deck flare, the support has moved further inboard.

The real dilemma now comes where I need to switch gears a bit, and get my “plan B” up and running so that I have a good, sorted fallback position for the worlds if this boat isn’t finished. This means that I need to get my new mast, boom and foils all working on Teknologika so I can take it to the worlds if Hyperion has not had enough setup time.

But at least it is looking like a boat now …

Well two things have killed the progress on Hyperion, first is starting a new job so I am now restricted to spending “normal” hours boatbuilding. The other is I have spent the last two saturdays out on the water.

With that said, work is continuing and the deck has literally just been bonded to the hull, “Closing the lid” … next up tagging the deck join and on to the wing mounts.

I wasn’t sure whether I was going to get new wing tramps for this boat, after ripping mine to shreds on Saturday, I will have to order some tomorrow …

It has been one very busy week.  I start my new job on Monday so we have been working flat out trying to “break the back” of the build. Just about everything has been on the agenda. Decking the new hull, making a new foil mold and making the gantry have all been happening in parallel. The new boat is being made with a few features done differently, and the wing lacing is one of them. Having the lacing go through the hull sides instead of the deck has meant I can remove the deck flare completely, but to do that has necessitated two 8 hour days of making deck flanges inside the hull for the deck to rest on. One key advantage of this method though is that there are no lacing holes into the hull, eliminating one of the main causes of moth hull leaks.



The top skin of the deck got laminated this afternoon with little to no resin to spare, but the resin fairy (aka Luka) is scheduled to make a morning drop off. So I can do the underside of the deck tomorrow or Saturday, “closing the lid”.



Now I need to track down Doink to get my hands on the foredeck mould …

After a week away up in Port Macquarie helping with the construction of a Farrier F22R. It was time to get back in the shed to get some work done.

The final frame has gone in, and been tagged, and I have almost finished work on the rudder adjuster and I started the bow forestay “fitting”, which has been built using an identical method to the chainplates on the F22R, although it has been rotated 90 degrees.

I also thought it would be a good time to “hit the scales” and the hull, with all the frames and CB case is 7.2kg, light enough to be lifted by my little helper (just).

I have 2 weeks of leave before I start my new job so the push is now really on to get the deck fitted ASAP.

The centre case is one of the key elements of any foiler that has to be 100% right. The fore – aft positioning affects foil spacing and mast balance, the angle of the case effects foil ventilation, and the height of the case effects deck curve, the height of the pin holes effects adjusters and can add unnecessary weight

Many many things that need to be thought through, and in advance as once she is in, things get a lot harder to change. That thinking process took a but longer than I would have liked, but she is in now, apart from the tagging of the frame and case itself.

When the lamination is done (tomorrow), the next “big thing” will be the work in the bow, to add the stem fitting, a couple of other reinforcements, and then it is time for the deck, then one of the jobs that I dread … tramp lacing holes.