Jumping ahead, you can see that the duct is in place.  Because of the massive plow plane, I filled the entire bow with 2 part Urethane expanding foam.  As one solid block of foam, the bow should be able to withstand hard impacts from waves, transitions, and so forth.  You can see many yellow circles around the bow.  I cut several holes in the upper deck to pure the foam in.

    I covered the nose with 1 layer of 9 oz biaxial Kevlar and 3 layers of 5 oz glass.  Because of Kevlars outstanding characteristics, sanding it is nearly impossible.  Most of the time, you end up with yellow fuzz.  The extra layers of glass allow me to sand later.   You can also see the Kevlar felt I used for the inner skirt tack strips, and on the landing skids for abrasion resistance.

    The Kevlar works great for skirt tack strips, and holds better than wood, and will never rot out.  It also works well for attaching guards to the ducts, windshield brackets, and anything else you may need to fasten to the craft.  If you're interested in using Kevlar for any part of your hover, send me an email.  I can supply you with as much felt as you'd like for about half of what other suppliers charge.  Email me if interested.

    You can see I've just stuck large sheets of glass on the nose to be trimmed later.  I did, however, cut the Kevlar to exactly the size I wanted before epoxing because it's nearly impossible to trim when cured!!  Also, notice how I've angled the bottom of the lift duct back towards the stern.  This does a couple of things.  First off, it helps to prevent water from splashing up into the duct and through the fan.  It also helps move air to the rear of the craft when underway.

    The nose and duct is almost ready to be glassed.

    Here's a better shot of the holes cut in the upper hull for the 2 part foam.

    As you can see, the foam exerts quite a force as it expands.  Here, it's pushed the nose up a bit.  The beauty of foam is that with a little bit of sanding, everything can be fixed!