Simon's New Balsa rigger.

[Simon.O.]

The repair begins

I now have cut away the damaged side skins and have an intact rear that needs a new front.
The front sides are made and include a significant overlap of material, this will be beefed up with more internal strength and another outer layer of diagonally laid 1" wide strips of cedar and balsa in an alternating pattern to create a tiger strip pattern. This will give me a lot more strength in the front than before but in reality probably still not enough to survive an impact like the one that caused this damage in the first place.

My rationale here is that it was originally designed and built to take a blowover and a diagonal end over end cart wheel type accident and it had indeed survived both of those types of events. Now I will have more strength and a easier frame of mind when it goes back on the water.

Good points are that the esc plus external bec , Rx, and servo all survived !
I lost one of the two 1800mAh 3S packs but that is no major loss to the wallet and they were about to be made redundant with the new 6S pack on its way from HK

Here are a couple of progress pics.

[Chris Harris]

Very cool! You are quite the "Crafty Craftsman"

Chris

[Simon.O.]

The new front is now attached and all the framing is in. I chose to do the diagonal bracing on the inside as it easier.
It is now more rigid than it was before and is indeed a lot stronger. Strong enough to survive an impact like that which caused this ?? Very likely not !!
....but those front sides are now 6mm or 1/4" thick laminated balsa and cedar so I know it is better than the last one.

I will now sand, seal, sand, seal and get the upper and lower bow skins on before I tackle the new hatch.

Some pics of progress for now.

[Simon.O.]

I got a lot more done today as it is real cold here so outdoors is not fun. They get snow further south but we just get cold and rain.
The rear boom receiver tube is in and there is 11mm of wood each side holding this gf tube. 4mm ply x 2 and 3mm of balsa sandwiched in there.
As you can see there is a lot of dead tree in the front now and I have even squeezed some noodle into the unused space.
Deck is on and hatch is now curing so it is time to make a new jig and set it up for the sponsons to go back on.

I'm getting there........it should be ready by the time my new pack arrives

[Chris Harris]

Boat is looking great Simon! Just out of curiosity what is the blue colored fitting in the front bulkhead for?

Chris

[CornelP]

Can I suggest a name for it: "The Survivor"...

PS: you really have to find a source for CF sheets...

[ray schrauwen]

Can I suggest a name for it: "The Survivor"...

PS: you really have to find a source for CF sheets...

The HK 1mm to 2.5mm 4" x 12" pieces are Awesome quality and finish!

I used the 1.5mm stuff I had around for my PTSS motor mount, very rigid and not bad to work with. True carbon fiber too.

I'm going to remake an rc motorcycle frame from the 2mm stuff. I got duped once buying cf and got alumaplate crap.

[Simon.O.]

Here is is on the makeshift jig to get it all square etc. The sponsons are now set at 3.5 deg AoA and I can possibly tweak then to 4 with little effort. I can use the strut to get 4 easily and this give me a little AoA on the tub too. fwiw 3 deg was good before so should be good now. If I need up to 5 like I have used on riggers I can build it in on the rear ride surface.

The new 6S pack is here and it fits very well, funny that

Chris Harris asked what the blue thing was and I will reveal that now, it is the front receiver for the batt hold down boom. This is a spring loaded gf shaft that slides in and hold the pack on the tub floor. The hatch is just to keep water out and not to hold packs in.: