Homebuilt UH-18SP Foam and 1/8" Plywood Hovercraft Hull - Page 3

The hull also makes a good workbench, this is why we made the cart for it so tall.

Next we cut and sanded the hull to its final shape. To do this we used a saber saw with a Saw sal blade ground down to fit in the saber saw. (thanks for the idea Earl)

Here is the hull after we cut it with the saber saw. We left it about 1/8" bigger so we could sand it and get a good 90 degree edge on the foam.

Here is another view.

And another view

Here is the sander we used.

It is just it is just 2 pieces of a 1x6 screwed together at a 90 degree angle with the piece on the side covered with a full sheet of drywall sandpaper.

Here is the hull after we sanded it to its final shape.

Here we have the outer skirt attachment strips temperarly screwed to the hull and a 1/2" x 1/2" x 20' wooden stringer temperarly nailed to the top of the hull. These will be a gide to run a hand saw along to rough cut the curve of the hull.

We used treated wood for the skirt attachment strips becuase when we went to look at Bob Windt's 18spw we noticed that they were routing. Bob Windt told us that after we get the skirt adjusted to run a bead of silcon calk down the top of the skirt between the skirt and the hull and to put a dab of calk on all the screw heads becuase water runs down the threads and gets in the wood.

We put that red strap on because the skirt attachment strip keep on trying to pull the screws out of the foam.

Now we ran a hand saw along the skirt attachment strip and the wooden stringer.

Here is the hull after we finished rough cutting this side of the hull.