Stringers and ribs

The stringers are 1/2" square.  They go lengthways along the boat.

The stringers are zip tied to the station molds.

The ribs are about 1 1/4" and 1/4" thick.  They are bent and placed outside of the frame to dry.

Our steaming setup is a 3" galvanized pipe about 5' long.  We put it over a kettle and sealed it with a dish cloth.  It did manage to scratch up the kettle quite a bit.  

The steamer took about 20 minutes to fully heat up.  Once hot, the average time was about 5 minutes in the steamer for each rib.  For the two end ribs that have steep bends, we left them in the bender for the whole time (probably half an hour or more).  Typically you can't bend them enough to make contact with the keelson.  In this case, you put a block between the keelson and the rib.  However, our bending was so awesome that the end ribs rest right on the keelson.

The ribs are bent around the outside of the stringer and the ends are tucked in behind the gunwales.  This helps them keep their shape as they dry.  In some instances where the wood wouldn't stay down close to the stringers, we zip tied it.  You can see this in the photo on the two end ribs.  

Once the ribs had a chance to form and dry in place (about 20 minutes or so), we moved them to underneath the stringers where they will ultimately go.  Then we zip tied them in place.  The rest of the ribs on the boat have had this done.