LT Peapod floorboard challenges

I am wondering if other have encountered some of these challenges when dealing with the floorboard installation and deviced any solutions thereto:

a) How do you drill the holes in floorboar 1 that are located next to the centerboard trunk? I can't get a right angle without having the drill head damage the trunk. I have tried to drive the screws in by hand and have some blisters to show for it.

b) Some of the floorboard developed a slight bend away from the natural bend of the hull, which creates some pretty big gaps. Even while appying quite a bit of pressure it is very hard to close these gaps. Has anyone had this issue?

c) After the dry fit, the manual calls for installing the boards one by one, appying epoxy into the holes and then silicones to the screws. However, given the time it takes to screw all of these in, the epoxy will be hard after the first couple of board. I see potential for a huge mess with multiple epoxy mixes that need to be put into the little bottles and then squeezed into he holes, while also handling a silicone tube, screws, positioning the floorboards and handling the drill. How do you get this done withouht having to mix multiple little batches and without getting epoxy and silcone all over your drill and boards?

Thank you for any help with this!

Jose


10 replies:

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RE: LT Peapod floorboard challenges

Jose,

Dewalt makes a right angle flex attachment for drivers that sells for about 30 bucks on Amazon.  If you add a chuck to it you can also use to drill.  https://www.dewalt.com/products/accessories/fastening-and-screwdriving-bits/sleeves-holders-and-drive-guides/bit-holders

I did not build a Peapod so i don't know what the manual says, but with the Tenderly manual it was clear that the intent is for you to let the epoxy cure and then redrill the pilot holes, not to screw in while the epoxy is wet.  For what it's worth, I skipped the silicone entirely by following CLC's drill-fill-drill method, by drilling the holes in both the floorboards and the frames oversized (1/4 inch i think is what i did).  Filled with epoxy, let cure, redrilled to proper 1/8 size. https://www.clcboats.com/shoptips/fitting_out/drill_fill.html

 

RE: LT Peapod floorboard challenges

   Thank you. That makes sense of the fill and cure, although it means removing all of the boards completely, as opposed to one by one like they show in the book. 

Thanks for replying!

RE: LT Peapod floorboard challenges

I put mine down this weekend. Was able to drill the holes at a bit of an angle and not mar the frames or cenerboard trunk for the most part, but there is a few areas where I will need to touch up some paint. As far as the epoxy/silicone dance, with the help of my bride of 32 years, a 20 cc syringe of epoxy and a tube of silicone was able to do it in one session. My biggest problem was getting the outer florboards to sit flush with the frames, in the end it turned out ok and as everything in the kit so far, fit like a glove.   

RE: LT Peapod floorboard challenges

   On the outer boards I have about a 1/2 inch gap between frame #3 and the bottom of the board. Even with a lot of pressure I can't get it to fit. I have even considered inserting a small piece of wood to fill the gap, or using longer screws.

I take it you did not let the epoxy dry before putting the screws back in?

Did you end of having to mix multiple little batches?

Thanks !

RE: LT Peapod floorboard challenges

   With the help of my bride I was able to do it with one batch of epoxy. After screwing all the boards in place, I removed one at a time, squirted the hole full of epoxy, wipped off excess, gave it a dab of sillicone, put the floorboard back down, put some silicone on the screw thread and drove them home with my cordless drill/driver. No, I did not let the epoxy dry first. As far as the difficutly with getting the outboard floorboard to sit on the frame, on the first side, I stripped out the screw on frame #4 and had to fill it and do it again, On the other side, I attached florboard to frame 5 and 1, then inboard sides of frame 2 and 4, after that I was able to pull it dow on the outboard side by pushing and alternating screwing the outboard side screw of frame 2 and 4. After that, frame 3 screws were a beeeze. Agree it is a bit of a challenge, but once it was in place, it fit great. Hopefuly I will not get boat rot because of the way I did it. Alaska has a short summer, and I want to get the boat in the water. Painting the hull now, waiting for sailing hardware, hopefully launch pictures in a week or two. 

RE: LT Peapod floorboard challenges

   Thank you for the detailed description. I kind of followed the same sequence witht the screws but for some reason in my case I still have the huge gap on frame 3. 

Enjoy your boat and the summer, would love to see pictures!

RE: LT Peapod floorboard challenges

 This may be a bit late, but maybe helpful for others. I, too found the florboards didn't sit tight on the frames, especially the first frame aft of amidships. I also wanted to eliminate 80 screws and collars holding them down.  I cut the floorboards right at the midship frame.  Added some extra pieces on fwd and aft faces of midship frames to add landing area for the cut floorboards.  Also added some small wedge shaped shims on the frame mentioned above, at the outboard floorboard location to let the outboard floorboards sit down without pushing.  Finally, added athwartships stringers on underside of floorboards just out of the way where they contact the frames to assemble them in four sections - fwd P&S, aft P&S.  Added "keepers" on the frames at the extreme forward and aft frames to tuck the floorboard sections under.  Lastly, the four sections are now all held in place by one fitting on either side on the amidships frame that holds both the forward and aft section down using only one screw/bolt/toggle (take your pick - I haven't yet).  There was also some minor shaving of the underside of some floorboards where they contacted their respective frames to keep everything nice and flat with no pressure.  No frame drilling with screw holes to be filled w/silicone and MUCH easier floorboard removal for cleaning/maintenance.  Hope this may be found to be useful. If you have questions, please don't hesitate to send me a meesage.  

RE: LT Peapod floorboard challenges

   I like your solution, very creative and practical. Could you post a picture of what this looks like? 

The CLC manual says that floorboards are "easy to install, easy to remove" I have found them to be anything but. 

Maybe suggest to CLC.

Jose

RE: LT Peapod floorboard challenges

   Based on all your experiences I got the floorboards installed. I made 1/2" shims for #3 and glued them to the boards to take up the gap. It worked well using 2" screws bought at Ace Hardware (stainless and you can buy them individually!!). #4 outboard looked to sit very high and so I used 2" screws there also to avoid the frame tearout mentioned. 

Quite the experience.

Dean

RE: LT Peapod floorboard challenges

I also found the included kit screws too short. Actually it is even more expesive than that.  I misunderstood some of the instructuions for the inwale/outwale installation and used some of the 1.25" screws there.  So I used the mistake as an exuse to "upgrade" the floorboard screws to silicon bronze screws, which astheically looked very nice, but to my chagrin, my box of 100 1.25" screws were not long enough in places.  So I had to buy a whole new set at 1.5" long.  1.75" would probably have been fine too.  

One thing I kind of lucked out on is I used a big 18" "Yankee Screwdriver" to drive the screws, which  meant I had more torque than a regular hand driver, but not as much as an electric drill, but more importantly being about 18" (at it's shortest) and relatively skinny, driving the screws near the centerboard trunk were no problem.  Plus it was satisfying using a yankee screwdriver to make a wooden boat.

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