FORWARD BEAM
july 2003

The Forward cross beam is composite and made out of several layers of carbon unidirectional fibers with some dual bias cloth in between it.

I started out making a male plug, half the length of the beam, I glassed a few layers of dual bias cloth around the outside. after it had set up I cut the glass on both sides of the plug and glassed the halves back together.

After doing this twice I connected all the pieces and this forms the inside of the beam.

I hung the beam between two sawhorses and put the rest of the cloth on.

The beam is loosely in place and now it is time to glass it to the hull, First I made the chain plates for the seagull striker out of carbon fiber and in the next picture Leroy is glassing them to the inside of the beam

In the mean time the walkway was build and loosely attached and the lay-up for the head stay chain plate is starting to shape up

 The attachment for the netting shows in some of the pictures. These are sections of 1/2" PVC pipe with a 1/4" stainless rod inserted in it. After the fairing is done I will cut away sections of the pipe and the netting can be attached to the exposed stainless rod.

Here she is ready for fairing,