Cradle Forms for a CH16??

Posted by Matt Croce on Mar 18, 2005

Continuing my construction of my first S&G, a Chesapeake 16. I just glued on the sheer clamps (I'm going to use a plane and a sanding block to slightly round over the lower corners for comfort -- should I do this over the entire length of the sheer clamp, or just in the cockpit area? I thought it might be easier to fillet around the bulkheads if the sheer clamps are not rounded where they go through the bulkhead)

Anyway, on to the real question. I've been using tips from Ted Moores book, and he highly recommends building cradle forms to support the boat while you assemble the hull. Any comments pro or con? I've already made the cradles; I figure that I can stitch the panels together, flip the hull over into the cradles, and evaluate the alignment of everything before I tab it and remove the wires.

One question I would have, is how to check the alignment; my table is fairly level (the table to which the cradle forms will be attached), but if I level the forms with some shims, I should be able to use them as my baseline, right?

Thanks in advance for any help.

Matt

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