Wilderness 1030 cruising catamaranDesign Concept Chris Dewar was looking for a catamaran that was economical to build, with a quick and simple method of construction to suit someone with no boat building experience. It also needed to be easy to handle for one or two people, fun to sail, and have enough accommodation to comfortably sleep a family of 4. Chris chose the Wilderness 1030 by Schionning Designs, which is offered in DuFLEXTM pre-routed, modular form making it ideal for amateur construction. The W1030 is designed as a fresh, lively little boat that is reasonably rigged and very light, making is an excellent performance cruiser, or fun for club racing.
Construction Chris had the strong-back built in readiness to use as a platform to manually join the DuFLEX panels when they arrived. A mixture of WEST SYSTEM® R105 resin, H206 Slow hardener and 403 Microfibre Blend was applied to the scarf joins to provide a structural bond on the Z-Joints. A combination of DuFLEX Composite Panels was used in the construction of the Wilderness 1030. 13mm for the majority of the parts, and 25mm for the bulkheads. The panels were cored with end grain balsa to provide stiffness and impact resistance suitable for a cruising cat. In DuFLEX kits, large parts, for example a topside panel, extend through several panels. Each pre-cut part is attached in the panel with small tabs to ensure the kit arrives with all components securely in place. These are easily cut away, once the panels have been joined, to release the full sized part. In the Wilderness range, the parts are laid over temporary frames and permanent bulkheads to form the hull shapes. Chris applied a mixture of WEST SYSTEM resin and hardener with 403 Microfibre Blend to form a structural cove between the panels, followed by double bias tapes over the joins on the inside and outside, these were laminated with WEST SYSTEM R105 resin and H206 hardener.
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