Pop top and main traveller

The trailer is still filling up my garage, and I'm working on it a little bit every day.  Yesterday I modified the fender attachments (as these were really bad/weak design, as well as a bit too high to clear the unfolding floats and too narrow to really cover the wheels), by cutting, bending and welding the ends, going for a different way of attachments.  This will lower the fender approximately 3,5 cm and move them out about the same. I've also prepared the ten square tubes to support the laminated 2" x 6" side supports.  I expect to receive most of the fabricated parts some time during next week.

Today I mounted the pop top.  Quite uneventful session, and everything seemed to work very well, except the anticipated problems with the upper bolt heads being too wide.  I have planned to cut back half the head as button head bolts in the required dimension was not available.

Testing pop top functionality:

Open, plenty of headroom

Partially closed, providing shelter in nasty headwinds?

Closed, this is where the bolt heads conflicts

I proceeded with making up an aft beam mount anchored jig to control the main traveller position.  Then I cut the brackets back to the required size and tacked them to the hull.

Temporarily kept firmly in place with a screw with big washer on each side.  The traveller is only clamped to the brackets.  This means I have to laminate the traveller to the brackets partially up side down, which is definitely undesirable.  The alternative seemed even less tempting, as placing the brackets on the traveller in the exact correct position and angle was very difficult.  I think this way it will be better, as I can avoid any tension in the system.