Farrell Trawler Rebuild Project

the beauty of Okoume.....aka Aucoumea klaineana

I'm not sure why I jumped ahead and epoxied the inside walls. I used a drywall putty knife to apply, so the layer is very thin. Looks nice. I guess I learned that it raises the grain, making the surface rough to the touch, and I'll have to do finish sanding and one more coat.

It sure is purdy. Did you find it up here, or down south?

One question, why to use carbon fiber for your fillet? What benefit?

L

Drifter,
Thought of you today.
Eating lunch in LaConner saw a Ferrell fishing boat across the channel. It looked small for some reason. Looked like about 28’. Did they make smaller boats?

Glad you’re making such nice progress.
There’s nothing like the pride of building your own boat.

MurrayM said:

It sure is purdy. Did you find it up here, or down south?

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Thanks! The plywood comes from West Wind Hardwood in Sidney BC. I get it shipped up via Bandstra.

Lou_tribal said:

One question, why to use carbon fiber for your fillet? What benefit?

L

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Thats a really good question. I'll do my best to explain, to help you get the feel of why I'm going with it.

--- Long Reply Alert :lol:
There is an aesthetic that I'm trying to achieve, a modern (high tech?) construction aesthetic. I think wood grain is beautiful, but I also really like the modern shiny black look of carbon fibre weave. You'll see that aesthetic more as the boat progresses. Stay tuned.

Okoume is beautiful, light, weak, and expensive. Carbon fiber is beautiful, light, strong, and expensive. Logically, I should use neither. But I'm a dreamer, artist, boat designer and builder.

There are a few places where the carbon fibre is providing a very quantifiable benefit (front window arch - very stiff). You'll get it, I think, when you see the windows cut out and when you see the finished window frames. But I want to extend that look, that aesthetic, throughout the whole construction.

I'm taking pride in my construction. It feels more satisfying building with higher end and higher tech materials. And in the end, its going to be built the way, and look the way, I want it to.

Nomad Willy said:

Drifter,
Thought of you today.
Eating lunch in LaConner saw a Ferrell fishing boat across the channel. It looked small for some reason. Looked like about 28’. Did they make smaller boats?

Glad you’re making such nice progress.
There’s nothing like the pride of building your own boat.

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Thanks! Mine is 29 or 30 depending on how its measured. They may have made a smaller one, but I'm not sure. I agree that Farrells can look small, for some reason. I'm working really hard, but having so much fun.

Thanks everyone for taking the time to post. I should have more pictures soon!

Wow! Really like the wood color and how the grain stands out! This will sound like a silly question, if you leave it just epoxied on the inside, do you plan to top coat the epoxy with a U/V clear coat for where the sun comes in the windows? The yard where I get my work done has had good success with West System on wood covered with automotive clear coat to protect the epoxy from the sun. May not be necessary on the interior of your boat.

Ted

O C Diver said:

Wow! Really like the wood color and how the grain stands out! This will sound like a silly question, if you leave it just epoxied on the inside, do you plan to top coat the epoxy with a U/V clear coat for where the sun comes in the windows? The yard where I get my work done has had good success with West System on wood covered with automotive clear coat to protect the epoxy from the sun. May not be necessary on the interior of your boat.

Ted

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Its a good question. I probably won't worry about the inside. System 3 epoxy does reasonably well compared to other epoxies as far as UV exposure goes.

One Ocean Kayaks did a test and System 3 did well.
Epoxy test.

In the pacific northwest, our sunshine comes in liquid form.......

Okoume is light. I'm not sure if it's weak. I know it's not the strongest. The GIS sailboat is built out of it and they are raced in various parts of the world. those guys are not easy on those boats either.

Hair straight back.

ben2go said:

Okoume is light. I'm not sure if it's weak. I know it's not the strongest. The GIS sailboat is built out of it and they are raced in various parts of the world. those guys are not easy on those boats either.

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Nice! I once had a Mirror Dinghy. Built that with my dad, which was my introduction to stitch and glue, and boat building....

Progress Report:
Cut out the windows.


Sanding...


more sanding....






Oh, and a door frame....


And now I'm getting a hankering for some glassing.....

Greetings,
Mr. PNW. I LIKE it! The only question that I have at this point is there seems to be quite sufficient curvature from side to side on the deck immediately in front of the new windows but is there enough front to back on that section. Looks quite flat. Could be the camera angle.


Probably a non issue but I thought I'd ask in any case...

Hi RT, thanks for posting.

I'm absolutely thrilled that someone is liking my work besides just me!

Alas, I only have side to side curvature on the front cabin roof. Its really hard to flex a larger sheet of plywood in more than one direction at the same time.

I do think it will look sufficiently "salty" as it comes together.

more progress

The roof of the front cabin is glassed with a hybrid innegra/basalt fabric. Harder to sand than glass or carbon fibre, but not as nasty as Kevlar.




Stay tuned for what I'm going to use to cover the rest of the boat.....

Originally Posted by Nomad Willy
Eating lunch in LaConner saw a Ferrell fishing boat across the channel. It looked small for some reason. Looked like about 28’. Did they make smaller boats?

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I did some digging, and as it turns out, Barrie Farrell made some 27' Snowballs (and other sizes) in Westport, Wash with Art White of White Industries. They look just like all the other Farrells, so it wouldn't be surprising to see a smaller Farrell.

Great article on Farrell in this periodical (page 12): https://www.harbourspiel.com/files/harbour-spiel-december-2013-issue.pdf

hair straight back....

Test fitting the rear door, sourced from RV. Nice thing is that it has a mosquito screen, essential when gunk holing during certain times of the year. I don't expect it to last forever in a marine environment.



Aluminized fiberglass.


Mind the head! haha....


I'm going to see how this turns out with a clear coat, but it could be painted over if I'm not happy how it turns out. Clear coat over a shiny sublayer shows every tiny imperfection.....

I haven't seen anyone do anything like this, so I'm headed into uncharted waters here. I wonder if it will help with radar signature?

PNW Drifter,
Thank’s for the link. I love these old tales about guys w an “airlock in their head”.
Yup he was definitely a serious and skilled builder and he did build quite a number of smaller boats.
I can’t get over how beautiful your forecabin front and arched deck is. Just perfect. Only boat I built this big had aflat foredeck. Was a prototype only but saw a few thousand miles of cruising. Kind-of a run what you brung deal.

coming along nicely!

glassing, glassing, glassing

Thanks again for your interest, and the positive comments.

It would have been great to have one piece of fabric wrap the front wall of the fore cabin or just two (spliced in the middle), but there would have been significant waste. As you can see, now I'll have to patch in additional fabric, but I just now learned that the patched piece grain will go the wrong way, unless I want to waste more fabric.


Prefabrication of the roof, by glassing it on the floor....


Working the fabric (wrapping curves, air bubble removal) requires a delicate touch, or otherwise the aluminum can wear off (from too much pressure and rubbing), or stretch/warp the fabric (which shows and doesn't look great) given that it is shiny silver in colour. Removing the green tape won't be fun either.

Also, it has become apparent that I will not be able to apply a finish and achieve the same result a brand new fibreglass boat that popped out of a mold. It is beyond my skill set. A friend said that expectation is too high, and accept that fact that one cannot easily replicate modern factory boat construction in a backyard workshop.

That being said, I'm pleased with the progress.

Greetings,
Mr. PNW. So what is the fabric? Is it that vinyl type film that they now use to re-"paint" boats or is this glass and resin? Whatever, it looks good.

RT Firefly said:

Greetings,
Mr. PNW. So what is the fabric? Is it that vinyl type film that they now use to re-"paint" boats or is this glass and resin? Whatever, it looks good.

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Hey RT, greetings from Terrace. Thanks for your question, and compliment. I'm using real glass and epoxy. For the deck I used a scraper, and the additional coats a brush to apply the epoxy (deck layer is quite thick), and then I smartened up and used a roller for the vertical. Vertical surfaces will run with a thick layer, so one must apply many thin coats.

It took some experimentation to find the right roller (a smaller one, designed for adhesives).

The fabric is called Barracuda, and I've sourced it from ProTech Composites.

Silver Barracuda Fabric 3k, 2x2 Twill - Protech Composites

Greetings,
Mr. PNW. Ah. Barracuda. Silver/chrome-nice touch. Gonna leave it silver? Looks sharp. You might highlight the chrome with black flames....Heh, heh, heh...

If you keep the silver touch be sure to get a perfect slick surface as highly reflective surface enhance any defect in the finish.

L

I have a charter boat with a plywood cabin that was covered with biaxial cloth and West system. It was built, clothed, then faired with West system and then red fairing powder. It was done expertly. However, after a year of 2 you could see wood patterning in the Awlgrip surface. The epoxy shrinks over time and the plywood surface changes. The cabin is every bit as strong, water tight and good looking as it was 14 years ago, but the inside (which only has one layer of biaxial cloth) shows the plywood patterning in many areas. The outside shows a little cloth patterning as most areas have 3 layers of cloth.

Ted

RT Firefly said:

Greetings,
Mr. PNW. Ah. Barracuda. Silver/chrome-nice touch. Gonna leave it silver? Looks sharp. You might highlight the chrome with black flames....Heh, heh, heh...

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Let's put them on your boat to see if they look good. LOL

Ok, the glassing is getting tiresome.....

Patching that little piece in:


Creative Clamping 101: Helpful tip: Use your workshop as a clamp. Ceiling for vertical, and wall for horizontal. :lol:
Epoxying in an oak strip to protect the exposed edge of the plywood. I will wrap fibreglass around it anyway, but I'm building it right, dammit!


I'm still amazed how the boat moving guy backed the boat into the shop perfectly, on the first attempt. She's a little tight!


Thanks for everyone's continued interest!

working hard!

Port Side gunnel. Walkable, but only just.


Glassing the rear cabin walls, that was pretty straightforward, I'm getting better at working the large fabric pieces without damaging them (visually) too much.


Back walls again


Detail of the front glassing work.


Perhaps not everyone's idea of perfect, but its as good as i can do without spending a million hours on it. Only other way would be fairing, and painting, which is also a lot of work. Still needs another coat or two of epoxy.


Getting there, one day at a time.

Do you plan to put anything outward of the fiberglassed oak rub rail? Maybe 1" x 1/8" thick stainless steel flat stock.

Ted

O C Diver said:

Do you plan to put anything outward of the fiberglassed oak rub rail? Maybe 1" x 1/8" thick stainless steel flat stock.

Ted

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I haven't thought that far ahead. I'll take a look at some of the similar kind of boats out there (Ranger/Nordic/American/Sundowner), and see what kinds of ideas they have.


more glassing


My first kind of semi-significant screw up. I've changed how this entryway is (cut the longer wall into the short little stub) as I didn't like what it was doing for interior cabin room. The door will be at an angle. I think the exhaust needs to move further aft (there is room), but I've already got the lower exhaust hooked up and in place, and I don't feel like re-doing that right now. I think moving the exhaust will happen later, after sea trials.

If this is your first oops, with everything you have done so far, you are doing really well!

Ted

It is not an "oops", it is a 'feature'.

glassing is a pain in the

Yes, OldDan1943, its a feature alright, but an kind of an unwanted one.....

Glassing rear cabin walls. Yes, Virginia, there will be windows.


Test fitting the pre-fab roof section....

full steam ahead.....

Glassing the front windows with one complete piece of fabric. It will be nice as there won't be seams, which I've discovered are a lot of work, and less seams looks nicer. It would have been easier if the windows openings weren't cut out, but given the size of the cut outs, I am hoping I can use the cut out pieces of fabric elsewhere.


Inside job!