The deck was built from the transom forward. The ply was glued and screwed to the frames and the inner stringers. To ensure that the scarf joints made good contact, I used a piece of pine covered in cling wrap on the down side of the deck. Screws were driven through the ply and into the pine. Ample glue was used on the join and when it had set the screws were removed allowing the pine to fall away. The screw holes were then filled with epoxy filler.
 
When the deck was finally attached the under deck support beams were glued and screwed from the underneath. The forward end of the support beams is slotted and then glued back together. Silicon bronze nails were used to hold the laminations at the forward end together while the glue dried.
 
All the corners were now filleted and a length of fibre glass tape with epoxy resin used to strengthen the bridge deck to hull join from the forward beam to about 300mm aft of frame 1. The top edges of the under bridge deck supports were routed with a rounding over bit.
 
The next job was to radius the chine and keel joins and to coat the whole boat with a TPRDA - epoxy resin mix in readiness for the fibre glass sheathing

This was the stage I reached in November 2003. The hulls fully skinned with the inner stringers attached ready for the deck.

The inner stringer was attached to the forward beam and inner skin as detailed in the plan. Blocks were added at the forward beam to increase strength of the join.

Once the skins had been finished and the joins planed flush - yes with my hand plane, rasp and file - the front face of the stem was flattened and a piece of coachwood glued and screwed on. This was shaped to the skin surfaces. I had to use some filler to fair the skins and stem cap.

Bridge Deck