Hydro Junkie

At this point, I attached the top of the cowl from the nose block to the top of frame 5A. After installing glue blocks to the upper vertical sides of the engine frames, I installed the upper cowl sides from nose block to the rear of the cockpit. The ledge panels were next installed from bow block to tails, giving a smoother look than with a stock kit build. Since the front of the cowl was glued to the deck, I coated the inside of the cowl from the bottom. I left the center of the cowl frames bare as that area is to be removed. I next laid out cut lines using dimensions listed in the kit directions and cut the cowl, removing the rear section that covers the engine and stock build radio box location. I next removed all of the excess material from the cowl frames and sealed up the remaining bare wood. With the cowl now completed except the wing, I installed the forward bottom. The left and right bow blocks were then shaped and installed. The outside of the boat was then coated with West Systems except the center of the bottom. This was left bare until the engine mounts and stuffing box were installed. I next fabricated a wing in the same manner as an airplane wing. Using the wing dimension from the Pak color sheet, I cut a piece of 1/32 ply to 12X3-1/2". I next installed a leading edge made of 1/4" square spruce stick stock. I followed this with a trailing edge made of 3/8X1/8" spruce stick stock. Using the wing tip shape from the color sheet, I cut 7 wing ribs from 1/16" ply and sanded to the rough finished shape. At this point, the wing top was sanded to get the correct airfoil EXCEPT the leading edge. I next attached the wing top skin and, after the glue cured, sanded the leading edge to shape. I didn't attach the wing at this point as it was still unsealed. I also still needed to round the front edge of both tails. This was the boat's configuration when I took the boat east. The picture on the right shows the boat as it was in Grand Rapids Michigan