Monday, July 23, 2012

Scarffing Made Easy.

My West System Scarffer showed up on Wednesday, and wow.  To put it simply- it's amazing.


The hardest thing about this tool was mounting it onto the skil saw, and even that was pretty straight forward.  Once it was in place, serious scarffing started to happen.


My greatest respect goes to those of you who can scarf by hand.  But for me, this tool has been a time saver.   In less than two minutes I had a perfect 1:8 scarf across a 4' plywood panel. 


Worth every penny.
Posted by at
Labels: ,

10 comments:

  1. DenisJuly 23, 2012 at 1:03 PM

    Hi Julie, great to read about all the happenings. Even though I won't need to scarf any plywood for my project, I read up on the scarfer you've bought. A handy thing indeed. Any gadget that can make our limited boatbuilding hours more productive is well worth the cost.
    Happy gluing.........

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Julie V.July 25, 2012 at 9:11 PM

      Thanks, Denis! I agree whole (or is it hull?) heartedly! Especially when we're limited to days that are relatively rain-free, which can sometimes be a rare occasion. :)

      Delete
    2. DenisJuly 26, 2012 at 1:24 AM

      This comment has been removed by the author.

      Delete
    3. DenisJuly 26, 2012 at 2:36 AM

      Yes, the weather isn't helpful sometimes. Low overnight temps have hindered my run at glassing the hull, thankfully this weekend seems promising. Have a few heaters ready as well. Although I don't have an agenda ( or a count down timer on my blog ??), I'm keen to move it along and flip it right way up.

      Delete
  2. Joel BergenJuly 24, 2012 at 6:17 AM

    Dang, those scarfs look perfect! Now I wish I had sprung for one of those scarfer tools instead of making my home made wooden one. It pays to invest in proper tools.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Julie V.July 25, 2012 at 9:14 PM

      Thank you, Joel! Your homemade one appears to have done a beautiful job on Ellie all the same. :) If (when?) you decide to build another boat and want to give this scarffer a try, you'd be more than welcome to borrow it!

      Delete
    2. Joel BergenAugust 1, 2012 at 7:54 AM

      Hey Julie,
      Just wanted to make sure you knew about this event coming up this weekend. A chance to meet JohnW and sail on a Scamp. I might be there with my Navigator, haven't decided yet.

      http://www.nwboatschool.org/alerts/Alerts_Detail.aspx?processID=99

      Delete
    3. Julie V.August 1, 2012 at 8:22 AM

      Hello Joel!

      Thanks for the heads up- for some reason I thought it was the weekend after next. I'll be there!

      Delete
  3. AnonymousAugust 23, 2012 at 12:55 PM

    I just received my scarffer and wanted to get a dedicated saw for it. Was the Skilsaw shown a good fit, and do you have photos of how the bolts are mounted? Any hints at drilling those holes? Thanks, Paul

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Julie V.August 24, 2012 at 11:03 AM

      Hello Paul!

      I published a post dedicated to your questions on my dedicated boat building blog, complete with photos. :) If you have any further questions or need any additional photos to clarify anything, don't hesitate to ask!

      Post found here: http://www.buildingasailboat.com/2012/08/a-further-discussion-of-west-systems.html

      Happy building!

      Delete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)