Tip #8: Study what the basic parts are
Buy 'Boats for Dummies' or something. The instructions assume some nautical knowledge so extreme apprentice boat builders like ourselves are at a bit of a disadvantage. Gunwales, shroud blocks, topsides, clews, transoms etc - all a mass of confusion - leading to staring at bits for ages trying to figure out what they are. A bit of knowledge actually helps 'cause the pictures and instructions aren't all that clear if you're a novice. IKEA needs to sell these boats...
Tip #9: Buy lots of hand clamps
These are proving very useful and well worth the money. Ours are of the finest Chinese quality and cost $15 for a pack of 18 in various sizes. Spend the dosh - you'll thank yourself. We ended up buying another 10 as they went on sale. Buy lots of these.
Tip #10: Have a metric tape measure handy, as well as a carpenters square
Our kit, being Canadian, features all manner of flip-flops between the Metric and American systems of measurement. OK, we can cope with that, but check out your tape measure - bet it doesn't have millimeters on it - you will need it so go buy one. You'll also need a carpenters square since knowing what is 90 degrees to something else is really helpful as the boat has very few straight edges so you'll have to pencil in your own reference points.
Tip #11: Don't throw out the box the Mirror comes in
We dismantled it keeping the top and bottom intact, but it's proven very useful to be able to use the parts as improvised tables, bits of rough wood, and so on. Hang on to the packaging for now; it'll come in dead handy. You'll see it featured throughout this website.
Tip #12: Pencil marks can be wiped off epoxy easily
An interesting plus to epoxying first, since strictly speaking, you don't have to. This may seem minor but many later stages require marking the position of things. Pencil on raw wood needs sanding off - pencil on epoxy primed wood can just be wiped clean! Cool. A minor sub-tip to add here - when you're done with the pencil marks, rub them off. We forgot to do this and ended up immortalizing one under the center line tape. Pretty obvious really. Sadly escaped us.
Tip #13: Wear gloves when twisting the wires
Interestingly, when tightening the wire stitches, you'll find that the 4" spacing is a perfect distance to scratch up your knuckles on the next stitch along. It took Mark about 6 times to realize he wasn't going to beat the odds. A slow learner so you don't have to be...
Tip #14: How to do the stitches easily (and avoid the Mark/Shawn method)
We learned the hard way by attempting to thread the wires and bend them into the holes on the other piece of plywood. Yeah, it works, but it takes ages and lots of gouged knuckes. After a while we finally figured out if you pre-bend the wire into a flared out cotter pin sort of shape, like this, you can just shove it in from the top and tie it off. Piece of cake, shame nobody told us the easy way. So obvious really, but then again, we're not that bright (blame the epoxy inhalation).
Tip #15: How to twist the wires 101
There's much debate among us on this one, and it has to be said, a very hurtful, and uncalled for, questioning of Mark's competence in this matter by you know who... Anyway, getting down to business, the hot tips here are:
(1) Twist the wires from the bottom, not next to the wood - it makes for a much tighter stitch.
(2) It also helps if one of you isn't somewhat left handed as the twists tend to be made in opposing directions - which leads to some interesting tightening attempts later :-).
(3) Also worthy of mention here, use bull-nose pliers. They make the twists about a billion times faster than the needle-nose ones we started out with. You'd have thought we'd have thought of that wouldn't you? Then again given our record, what can you expect...
(4) Oh, and also don't attempt to reuse any stitches you pull out for any reason; the copper is done for after one twisting and it just breaks off
Tip #16: Don't even bother trying to mark the holes all the way along the topsides.
Mark tried and the curves will get you every time, (with about a 1/2" drift by the time you get to the rear transom). Do about 3' at a time, working from the front, align the topside and drill in situ - don't bother marking - that's for sissies, Apply the stitches as you go.
Tip #17: Try to avoid nailing yourself to the boat when fitting stringers
As you move towards the front of the boat (technical term: the pointier bit), the upward angle becomes more pronounced (a common feature of boats as we understand it). The instructions say to drill holes for the nails that hold the stringers 1/4" down from the fitting line. Sooo, as you move towards the front, the nails start to point upwards. Why do you care? Well, as Mark discovered by nailing his fingers to the boat a couple of times, they protrude through the top of the stringer and nail whatever happens to be there (in this case, Mark). Easy solutions include drilling a little lower down at the front, drilling and nailing horizontally, and generally keeping your fingers out of the way. A minor sub-tip in the same genre to mention here: don't drill towards yourself while you're up against the boat - that stings a bit too.
Tip #18: Have an 'Exit Strategy'
Didn't really occur to us (of course) but when building a boat make sure you have an exit from wherever you're building it that's big enough to remove the finished product. We'll have to see.
Tip #19: Double-measure the bulkheads when you put them in
We didn't and ended up 3/8" out in a couple of places. This somewhat sucks and will require a bit of creative shimmying of the decking (though a couple of stout whacks with a mallet mitigated the problem), and some wide fillets, plus it means you have to do more custom cuts to keep everything looking true. It'll be fine at the end of the day but more fussing around than is needed. So, get out that tape measure and make sure your bulkheads are square to the transoms. Another obvious one we overlooked as expected.
Tip #20: Do build a cradle for the boat (dead easy too)
Here's an unusual tip since we actually did something right. Make a cradle to screw onto your sawhorses ('step and fetch it' if you're Canadian) using the front and rear bulkheads as templates. Draw a line 1/4" wider than the bulkheads on some scrap, cut it out, and fix. This trick will hold the boat nice and steady as work progresses.
Tip #21: Never waste any spare epoxy
It seems that whatever you do, there's always a bit left over. Assuming you're not trying to build a one-season racing boat and worry about a few extra ounces, we say use whatever you have left over to add a little glue to whatever gap seems not adequately secured.
Tip #22: Use 'Rib Spreaders' to fit the thwart
Never thought it would happen - we had a good idea. The thwart (aka the bench seat) appears way too big to fit between the side tanks. Before you go off trimming stuff, spread the side tanks apart using a couple of pipe clamps in reverse. Gently crank until things are spread enough for the thwart to fit in, which it does, rather easily, using this technique. Brilliant and rare. Savor it.
Tip #23: Don't use a stringer with a knot in it for the side tanks
Fitting the centercase and thwart puts a lot of pressure on the stringer. In our case, the stringer cracked at the knot. Really obvious to most folk but us. Toss the piece and save yourself the later repair. It's only cheap softwood anyway.
Tip #24: Check everything is at 90 degrees on the centercase/thwart
Easy to do at the time you're putting this together but imposible to change when the epoxy sets up. We were lucky that our efforts were only a few degrees out and won't be easily noticed. Avoid precious moments with the three degrees (Ah, Motown..).
Tip #25: Epoxy and West 407 microfibers are really good
You read about people routing out channels to hide the fiberglass tape. Don't bother - the 407 does the job hiding them so don't worry about precision engineering. Butter at 65 degrees consistency is best for fairing. 50 grit is the sweet spot for basic sanding. It's a good thing.
Tip #26: Keep checking the boat to make sure it's in true
Everytime you add something there's the potential to alter the dimensions in a way that can push the boat out of true or introduce a twist. This will happen - there's no way around it. Make it routine to check the boat for true every time you do anything, and make the correction before any epoxy cures. We found really heavy weights effective but all sorts of things will work, including a decent sized wife if she can be persuaded to sit still long enough.
Tip #27: Know what bits are visible and what aren't
Whether slopping glue around, or being overzealous with a rasp, chances are some of your 'handiwork' will show and require serious clean-up. Study the pictures here and know what bits show and what don't. If you're sloppy inside a sidetank, who cares as nobody will ever know :-)
Tip #28: Buy at least 3 pipe clamps
Among the most useful tools we have. It would be very difficult to work on the boat if we didn't have several sets - we used them extensively throughout. A serious tip. Buy them. Right now.
Tip #29: Test fit the side tank tops better than us
We didn't do too badly on the horizonal fit, but neglected to pay enough attention to the vertical leaving a less than smooth transition between front and rear decks. This will be minimized through a bit of nifty filling and sanding, but this leaves the edges weaker than we'd like, and could have been easily avoided if we'd paid more attention. Another fine example of how we made it harder for ourselves through rushing. Don't rush. It's bad.
Tip #30: Don't sweat the inner gunwales front transom fit
It's a tricky compound angle but don't worry about it. It's totally hidden by the bow shapes and if you're off, nobody will ever know. Fit it snug if you can but don't lose any sleep.
Tip #31: Use Epoxy/microfibers in the hull joints before you tape
Amazing we thought of this but, since the joints tend to have gaps when you turn the boat over, it seemed to us that taping over an air gap will be less strong than if you were to fill the joints with epoxy/microfibers first. We filled the gaps, then taped over. Worked pretty well. Amazing.
Tip #32: Fit the inner gunwales starting at the front
It's easy to snap these things as we found out twice. The easy way to fit these is to start at the front of the boat. Clamp the front and work towards the back, slowly bending the piece into place, and clamping as you go about every foot or so. Works great. Save yourself from our screwups.