Update:
Dinghy panels are now assembled!
All parts were cut from 5mm plywood. For me this is intended to be a short-term dinghy and a learning experienced so I did not use marine grade plywood. It will be sheathed in fiberglass so should hold up a few years anyway.
The Maslow did a very nice job of cutting. I used a 1/8" down cut bit (1/4" shank) at about 13,000RPM, feed rate 700 mm/min, cut depth 2mm (makes quick work of 5mm plywood!). I was able to cut within about 3" of the edge and still cut quite accurately (except the far lower left and right corners where my Maslow often has some accuracy issues). The 1/8" bit makes a much cleaner cut in my experience than a 1/4" bit in such thin material. In the case of this plan I needed to make some slots the same size as the thickness of the plywood so could not cut these slots with a 1/4" bit anyway.
In order to cut this close to the edge, I could not use clamps in the area being cut because they would interfere with the sled. So, I counter sunk small screws along the perimeter of the work piece. This is needed for cutting such thin plywood as it does not lay as flat as thicker stock, and any unlevel areas will effect the Maslow’s depth of cut.
On my Maslow I built a “skirt” along the lower edge to support the bottom edge of the sled when cutting near the bottom edge. Without this support the sled will tilt when the edge of the sled goes over the edge of the work piece. This allows me to cut close to the bottom edge as well.
One problem with using the Maslow for this project is the fact it cannot cut to the edge of the material. In this case the “topside” panels use the full length of a sheet of plywood…right up to and including the factory edge. To work around that limitation, just in the case of those 2 panels, I had to shorten the drawing by a few inches, cut these incomplete panels, then cut the remainder separately. I drew the remainder up separately (only a few inches of the bow end of the topsides) and significantly longer than needed. This extra length was to allow me to make a “scarf” joint to add this small piece to the larger panels. Ideally a scarf joint would be included in the original design and cut by the CNC or at least cut using a jig. However, since it was such a small scarf joint (just a few inches across), I just roughed it out by hand using a big sanding wheel on an angle grinder. It came out better than I expected. I glued in place with epoxy then filled and faired the joint. All other pieces of the plan were cut completely by the Maslow.
The construction method is “stitch & glue”. Using this method you “stitch” the panels together by drilling small holes along their perimeter and connecting them via cable ties or wire. I used galvanized wire since I had plenty on hand, it can be adjusted if needed (unlike a cable tie), and in the end I’m not tossing a bunch of plastic into the environment. After stitching you then temporarily secure the panels into place with epoxy glue. This is a quick and easy construction method.
As of today I have stitched and glued the complete main hull and dry fit all the bulkhead and seat panels. The main hull panels went together quite well with almost no fairing needed. I did have to make some adjustments to the bulkhead panels, but these were just a matter of a few millimeters here and there (my jig saw blade is about 2mm thick so often just one saw kerf wide).
I think the accuracy of the Maslow made this process go much smoother and quicker versus hand cutting with a jig saw (common practice for amateur builders). When cutting by hand, the cuts are relatively rough and inaccurate. A common practice is to cut out side the plan lines and then fair the cut down to the line using a block plane/sanding. Doing this for every cut on every panel would have consumed a lot more time. Cutting with the Maslow almost eliminated this step. I just did some light sanding of cut edges to debur them. The only significant errors I encountered were either due to errors I made in drawing the plan and/or scaling errors between software tools that I missed correcting.
Pic attached of hull with bulkheads/seats dry fit.
