Welding a steel hull

from reading your posts, and building a pic, you do not work to any set plan, it seems you take something, and where the shell ends up, you build the componants to fit it, this is your way, I accept it is your way,
but it is a like a cave man taking a log, hollowing it out and then fitting whats necessary after. Perhaps one day you will see the sense in building the right way
Sure there is more than one right way to build a boat, but there are no short cuts, and your SHORT CUTS, I am sure do not save time at all, if you see this cutaway, every thing you see there is cut to within.5mm under, nothing over, by hand power saw, welded up as a base, the shell last, it works, nothing is guessed
dwg by bhnautika

 

Welding

Lazyjack
I don' t believe that your outdated framed methods can put together a 36 foot hull in three days. Colvin estimates 1,000 hours for a job I do in less than 100 hours. I don't belive that you can do 7 times the amount of fitting cutting grinding and welding in no less time than I take using more modern methods of construction. I don't believe that you can do all the welding, including tackup, in a conventionally built steel 36 footer using stick welding ,in 350 hours . I don't believe you can build a boat out of many small pieces welded together and get as fair a hull as building each side from a single 8 ft by 36 ft sheet. Anyone who claims he can is a liar.
The peening I mentioned was for my last boat, built using your methods. I've built 3 dozen boats since then and learned a lot in the proccess . My comments on peening were to try to lessen the burden for those who are stuck in the past. They deserve sympathy, not imitation.
When you cut out six square plates and join them together corner to corner, then the final shape is a foregone conclusion. The same is true of more complex shapes like a hull and decks. I've taken measurements of several of my 36 footers from hull deck joint to centreline, and various other measurements , and found them the same within 1/16th of an inch.
The rest of us should not base our choices of boat building methods on any one individual's inability to comprehend basic geometric facts. To do so would keep us locked in the past.
One common criticism of education systems around the worlld is that they cater to the lowest common denominator, and the slowest learner in the classroom sets the pace for the rest. There is no need to allow that to curtailing progress in steel boatbuilding and design.
What you do was proper before improved methods like origami came along . What I do is the proper way to build small steel boats today.
You remind me of the livery stable owners of days gone by , saying " Forget that new fangled horseless carriage. Do it the proper way, by horse and buggy."
The Red River cart was once considered the only "Proper Way" to cross the country. Sure glad someone had the nerve to do it the wrong way that we use today.
Do you do it the proper way, by Red River cart, or the wrong way?

 

"You remind me of the livery stable owners of days gone by "

You remind me of a broken record. Luckily we have moved on and have CDs and Ipods.

Not everybody wants a "swain" boat, so your methods are very limited in scope.

I consider your building techniques ancient. Modern computer design and NC cutting would allow one to easily build a NEW design far quicker and cheaper than the "by gosh and by golly" method.

I don't like to post such criticisms, but your short sightedness of only wanting to do something one way shows little creativity.

Stop posting the same comments over and over again. It's childish.

Mark Ovenden

 

Listen Brett Swain.I made no comments abt putting a hull up in 3 days, but while you trying to fit stuff into your (hull) a professional trained builder, will have his built as will tankage, keel; the lot
This is the first time with CAD, it makes things easier, but even without I used to draw this exactly as you see it on the full sized loft
in fact I think the pc slowed it down, except for the plate developements which are really handy and most of all not having to PROVE the lines, which can take a couple of weeks, from offsets to corrected lines, as it used to be done
Yes your record needle is stuck in the same old slot,You kinda have this EVERYONE IS OUT OF STEP BUT ME thingie going
you could learn here, make friends, but you keep beating up on yourself, now go away and hug a tree, or one of those pipes you stick around your sheer as a cap

 

Mike Welder/fitter
I bit the bullet and bought a roll of lincoln outershied 71M. .045".
Nice stuff, easy to dial in and make beutifull welds with. I was welding on rusty scrap with mill scale, big fan and cooler running didnt seem to have any affect on it. Does have a heavy slag and expencive compared to regular mig or stick. For building outdoors doing a smaller boat single chine or origami dont know if it would be worth it or not but doing larger with lots of welding it would be top of the list. IMHO.

To others
I have often wonderd about stringers and stiffners inside the hull, it's a problem blasting and painting under the edge attached to hull, even pre blast and paint before assy. you have small area behind welds unprotected. Why couldnt the edge be ground or milled to a V or small radious before welding in then blasting would get close to 100% under and painting would be easy enough to get all of it ?
Tom

 

hello Mike
No you can not get under the frame, but you can get preprimed steel, on the other hand that needs paint on top
In tanks and wet areas, it does become a real issue So there are a couple of things you can do And if you do not, rust will rear its ugly head in time
One, forget stringers, and use frames
At the flloors reieve the plate between welds, that is if you have a 4x 3 x 4 your notch out where there is no weld and weld right around, so there is a seal. like a chain weld but welds join as they go to the other sides at end of notch, aslo do this on your t,s or angles
This works and looks WOW if the notches are nicely done
Or you could use preblasted on Corten steel If you use Corten , or any other like it

Or change to Al Al
wish you good day
Stu

 

What I usually do after the hull is shotblasted and before the primer get sprayed on, is to strip paint all the stringer / frame joints and corners etc with undiluted epoxy primer.
This I apply with a paintbrush straight out of the tin (hardener added) and work it into all spaces and voids and corners very thickly and only then spray the primer coat on.

BTW Stu, I think Corten is very over rated in steel boat building compared to mild steel penny for penny ;-)

 

With Cad cut plates you could put together a 36 foot hull easily in a day.
Lazyjack, it is you and Mike who are the broken records. I suggest a way to modify the bends in a flatbar, and the lack of need for plate edges to be peened in certain types of boatbuilding , and you instantly turn it into an attack on origami boatbuilding. Don't ever expect me to let your childish comments go unchallenged . It could cost someone their cruising dreams, as your labour intensive, expensive and complex building methods have so often done . ******** unchallenged becomes naivly accepted as fact by some.
May be you too could eventually learn to build boats the proper way; when you grow up.
I have seen steel in a Y section used for fenceposts. That would be easy to paint under, and as stiff as t sections.Easier to bend than angle too.. I don't know how available it is in longer lengths, but it does exist.
Tom, your idea of grinding a V for weld penetration on stringer welds would work OK. We haven't had any problem with angle stringers because we have been ordering it al wheelabraded and primed with cold galv primer. I haven't found flatbar as stiff as I would like for stringers.
I once watched a boatyard forman in Auckland plate his round bilged 36 footsailing hull by using the shrinkage of the edges of torch burned plate for his compound curves, The only plate he had to roll was the turn of the bilges.
Having built boats out of Corten , he also said corten was a waste of money and grossly overated.
Brent

 

The speil above reminds me of a "Jack in a box" same childrens show every time, and we are not an appreciative audience for arguments aimed at a neophyte.

Stick to meaningfull arguments or go back and address some of the issues you ducked in previous threads after this sort of nonsense, Red River carts and the like ...didn't you learn from DanishBagger about logic last time ?



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On stringers and frames touching the plating, I have never seen much of a problem with this providing the mill scale was removed prior, and that it is painted as Wynand does well saturated with a brush. we specify a zinc rich undercoat being either epoxy or chlorinated rubber for steel.

Also often lacking are reasonable limber holes that can be added quite freely as they are usually on or close to the nuetral axis of a bar stiffener. Also a polyurethane sealant bead can be run along the plate stringer interface with the same radius as the welds up to the limber hole, this seems to work very well in sealing the gap and even channelling the condensation if you are not 'foaming' the interior. It also appears to work well even if there are no limber holes (it stops that cavity/interface corrosion anyway).

Sorry Wynand
Wandering off your topic.

 

there were some boats built by
a dutch guy in the 60,s in Auckland, they are nice boats, plenty shapes, they are as new today
Corten is hard to roll, really tough, it used to deform my 5 inch rolls, and that was only with 1/4. plate 600 wide!! so wheels had to be used, , I never built myself with it, just had some yard wanted me to roll a couple of transom cnrs, and found out just how amazingly strong in tensile and yield it is. Lo Hydrogen too, is not so easy to weld But say you were 1/4 0r 6mm, you could come back to 5/32 or 4mm,
brent Swain, I am sorry I missed the bits abt flats, thats probably cos I dont finish all your posts, you lost too much credibilty and when offered olive trees you ignore, Be happy!!

 

I posted a question somewhat related to this topic but off topic enough to have its own thread. I'd love to get you guys comments. http://www.boatdesign.net/forums/showthread.php?t=24066

About protection under stringers and frames, as the painting of the interior of my hull is coming up soon I have been thinking about it and came up with an idea different from what I have seen done. All my plate and frames have been sandblasted and primed on the interior prior to assembling.
I am planning to apply in all the corners of meeting edges a low viscosity/high surface tension epoxy primer, this stuff crawls in all the little knick knacks. I want this paint to be coating only for the unaccessible surfaces.
I will then proceed to the final sandblast and to the application of the proper epoxy primer.
I have seen the low viscosity/high surface tension epoxy primer applied as a first coat on the whole hull interior but would rather have my first coat be the paint designed for maximum protection with optimum characteristics. Yet I also see the benefit of a runny high surface primer to get in voids. By applying it along frames before the final blast the runny primer will get where other paint wouldn't go and will not get blasted off, and where some will be blasted of I rather have the bar rust 235 applied.

Cheers,
Murielle

 

Brent Swain quotes:

“If the metal is sticking out beyond the flux, it will stick , Drag it across the steel until the metal is well back from the end of the flux”
“Drag it a few times until you hear the hollow sound, then drag it up to your weld and continue welding.”
Sure, what’s a few hundred hard spots?

“That is why a while ago 6011 was the only rod that Lloyds would approve of for small craft.”
What? How long ago? Asked local Lloyds inspector about this. He said, “ Not in the last 30 years that I know of, anyway.” One should remember that Lloyd’s & ABS set minimal requirements and that builders often build to a higher standard.

“A good cut needs no grinding, unless you are trying to maximise the number of hours you are being paid for. Shipyard workers do that a lot.”
Shipyard workers do this a lot, because Lloyds & ABS require it. I suppose if one weren’t concerned with carbon inclusion or surface hardening, and a risk of resultant weld defects, or one’s job, or the nightmare that one is leaving for the fitting & welding, one could live with such poor steelworking practices.

Small steel boats are so grossly overbuilt , that any discussions of welding rod choices is a purely acedemic debate, with nothing to do with the extremely remote liklihood of welds ever failing.”
Unless, of course, those welds are what keeps the water out of your boat and your boat together, in which case, there is a value for many in ensuring that the finished product is as high in quality as can be achieved.

When I jack the stern up to put the skeg on , the foreward centreline is horizontal , a good time to 7024 weld it, before jacking the bow up to put the keel on.
Brent
That’s very scary. 7024 welds are quite brittle and not suitable for structural weldments.

AC with 6011 is far better than DC for fitting , as it is far less prone to sticking when you are in an awkward position.
Brent
Nonsense.

Welders working on one of my boats said" Brent is a good fitter, but the only problem we have is he doesn't grind all the edges." I said" Do you know what they call a fitter who grinds everything? A slow fitter."
What do they call a fitter who doesn’t grind his edges? A)Unemployed. B) useless C) Brent Swain D) All of the above.


My boats that have sold , were all sold for far more than the owners had invested in them. Several 36 footers have sold for over $100,000 , and even roughly finished ones sell for around $65,000, still many times what their owners had in them.
They all pass survey with flying colours , and several have been built under the watchful eye of well respected surveyors.
The coast guard have admired and praised my boats, calling one the best built boat they had ever seen.
ROFLMAO! We’ll need a bigger shovel for this pile!

Then, of course, there is the "built more than 36 boats" rant. Lets disect this; Brent says that he works 1 month per year, cruising/doing other things - like a lot of posting of threads - for the other 11 months. This would mean that Brent would have had to build a boat every year, since 1971/72. But wait, it also means that Brent has taken only a month to build each boat, and that is simply amazing. Conversely, it means that Brent has had a month of involvement in the construction of each of these boats. If I can say that I have repaired or built every ship, boat or barge that I have worked on for a period of one month or more, Then I should be able to tell people that I've built over 100(arbitrary figure) marine vessels. I wonder how my co-workers, contractors and employers would feel about me taking credit for the whole job.

I have no complaints with the origami method of construction. By adding a second chine, some designers and/or builders have come up with something that looks more like a sailboat, than a squashed shipping container.

As for Corten, there is a family of (HSLA)high strength, low alloy steels available. Obviously, the increased cost of using HSLA makes the use rather limited. While these steels have a value, I don't know if that value can be seen in small boat building.

Glad you had the opportunity to try the fluxcore, Tom. A smaller diameter wire would probably be prefered for welding the thinner gauge materials. Still, as has been aptly covered by one and all, there is no panacea, fluxcored or solid wire, or stick will do the job. You can usually buy as small as .035" fluxcore(most types). On a recent island ferry build, some of the welders were having a challenge keeping their beads to under 1/4" with the 1.4mm. While you've got some wire left, try a vertical down, single-side groove on plates with the wire & 6010/11. I'm interested in what your impressions are.

 

I have found that, if using pre-primed, wheel abraded steel, spraying the heat affected zone with weld-through red oxide primer, after each day's work, is sufficient in preventing oxidation. Most internal rusting is attributed to debris collecting and blocking moisture from it's path to the bilge. Limber holes(mouseholes) must be of sufficient size to reduce the magnitude of occurence.
Mike

 

smiles at above posts, larfs even,

we never grind our welds in alloy cos then you are in trouble, just use our meetaxes, and saws, COME ON GUYS CHANGE OVER:: GOT TO GO AWAY LONG WHILE eU, SEE YOU

 

I've never seen any problems below where the stringers come up against the hull plate in the 32 years I've been building steel boats. So don't worry about it. I never fully welded my bulwark cap on the outside 24 years ago and can't see a drop of rust there despite many Pacific crossings. If there were a problem it would be very obvious.
On several of the boats I've pulled together ,I farmed out the cutting and welding on of stringers and bulwark caps , so only had to put less than 40 hours of my time in to get the hull, decks cabin wheelhouse , cockpit,keel , rudder and skeg installed . Working with people who have a plasma cutter and torch ,and who know a bit about using them ,I have done shells in 6 days , hull decks , keels, cabin, cockpit, wheelhouse, rudder and skeg. Some years I have done no boats , other years I have done 7 .Average one or two a year. I can pull together 4 a month.
Between the summer of 83 and summer of 84 I built Silver Moon, then Pearl Song , then Bruce Atkeys 31 footer, then Ainsley Tripp's 36 footer , then my own 31 , then Uller and Moon Raven.
I agree, there is no way I could have possibly built that many fully framed shells using your methods, in that much time. The time difference between origami and traditional is that huge. You made my case . Thank you. Lazyjack, your comments make it crystal clear that you know absolutely nothing about origami boatbuilding, so educate your self. Buy a copy of my book, Alex's DVD showing the proccess, plans ,then build one, and you will have 1/36 the the experience that I have in building them, infinitely more than you now have. You will quickly learn the difference between theory and reality.
Anyone who insists on frames can quickly pull together an origami hull and easly install whatever frames he feels comfortable with, saving the huge amount of time Lazy Jack refers to. However , once the hull and decks are together , the redundancy of transverse framing becomes self evident to all but the dullest.
Try that with your imitation wooden building methods.I'm not using your super slow building techniques. There is no comparison.
How many shells have you built?
The "Be reasonable and do it the hard way " school of thought has cost far too many people their cruising dreams, promoting an elitism in boat ownership that I find totally disgusting. Many of the people whom I have built for could never have afforded a good cruising boat had I insisted on the " Be reasonable and do it the hard way " philosophy. I feel great sense of accomplishment having helped them get off the treadmill and out cruising quickly and affordably in some of the safest boats out there, a sense of accomplishment that lasts long after the money I earned has been spent.
Many of my clients have a huge amount of offshore cruising experience and wouldn't consider building a boat any other way. One veteran of a circumnavigation, a circle pacific trip ( BC Hawaii, japan , the Aleutians and home) and a single season passage thru the NW passage in one of my designs , is on his third origami Brentboat. His daughter has one too.
Be skeptical of anyone who tries to tell you that the only possible way to do anything is by the most labour intensive and complex way possible. They may cost you your dreams.
If dragging a rod across a piece of steel changed it in any way, it would quickly and obviously show up when you bend the plate. It hasn't happened yet in over 200 origami boats . We've done a lot of rod dragging and plate bending. Try it with a piece of scrap. That should establish who's credible.
Many multichine boats have been built using origami methods. I built one that way, but don't like it for aesthetic reasons. You can hide a single chine below the waterline, but not the upper chine in a multichine hull. The hull between the sheer and the waterline on most classic round bilge boats has very little round or flare in it.Thus single chine boats look alot more like round bilged boats in the water than multichine boats. I can't think of any other advantage to multichine. Multichine hulls are alot more tricky to pul together.CAD is a huge advantage there.
Brent
Greg on origamimagic has many origami mutlichine aluminium designs.