GERONIMO's progress and advice

[bobinpowayca]

Howdy, I'm on the motorwell area of my Geronimo. I went a little wider with the floorboards and extended them back into the transom, and put side walls on the outer battens so I could do pour in place foam in the side cavities. The bulkhead will be at frame 1.
I framed around the opening and top of the transom with 1 1/4" white oak, as well as the athwartship brace. The motorboard is only 1 7/8" so that should stiffen it up. Motorboard is a sandwich of the transom and another 3/4" ply with a 3/8" piece in between. Looking back I would've gone a little thicker here but I think it's fine now.
What I'm wondering how to do now is to trim the top of the transom and around the motor opening. Basically the the top and opening is about 2" wide. Also trying to think of ways to do the curve part. I have'nt seen any examples .
If any of you folks have pictures or suggestions on how you trimmed out this area I'd appreciate seeing them. Thanks for your advice, Bob

[JimmY]

Laminate a trim piece. Cut some thin strips, soak them in water and wrap them around a form or clamp them in place. Once they are dry, add epoxy. If you do corner pieces around a small form, you can throw it in the microwave to steam/dry them faster. White oak can be steam/water bent if you want to finish it bright.

I recently laminated trim pieces for my Squirt with this method. See the end of my thread in the Small Outboard forum.

My $0.02

[bobinpowayca]

Thanks, Jimmy I'll check it out. Bob

[Craig Aho]

Hi Bob, I just in the last few weeks just went ahead and added glass cloth and resin to my exposed plywood edge in the motor well and am satisfied with that. I can now just paint it and the glass cloth will add some durability to the area. I had thought of added veneer tape or laminating a nice wood piece on top but the quick and easy way for me was the cloth.

Craig

[mrintense]

You've probably already seen what I did but here goes anyway. I Laminated a 1/8" thick strip of African mahogany to the cutout area. I had to make a special jig to hold in place when I steamed it. That got it close enough so when I later epoxied it in position, it went in nicely. I used staples to hold it in position while the epoxy cured. I would have preferred a vacuum bag approach but I didn't have one available. Later I stained and fiberglassed the transom.

[bobinpowayca]

I like it Carl. One thought I had was whether to make it flush with the transom faces and I see you've done that, it looks clean. Mine will be painted so it will look like a clean cutout rather than a picture frame look.
What I probably won't do is attempt that 90 degree curve steam bend - since I'm painting maybe I'll just make square joints and put a filler in the corners. Thanks, looks good. Bob

[hoodman]

Looks good Bob, I'm planning on putting my bulkhead at frame 1 too. Its the only way I can see being able to get a reasonably sized gas tank back there.