San Francisco to Olympia is a Long Commute

This is a picture of a tree in the eveing light.  It is a couple blocks from the boat shop, and I walk by it every day that I go there.  For most of the year it's a fairly non-descript young maple tree, but for a couple weeks it really put on a show.

JD was here and now he has gone and I'm alone in the boat shop again.  Three days is not long enough.  However, we made a great leap in our progression toward actual boatiness.  Two garboards are glued in place, and they'll soon be ready for the next planks to be attached.  

[Warning! The next passage may contain indeciferable technical jargon.  Read at your own risk.]

I still have to cut the overhang off of the port garboard in the stern, and then check the curve of the sheer side (top) of both garboards.  Then I'll bevel the sheer edge of the garboards where the next planks will lie and we'll be ready to rock again.  I anticipate the beveling taking some time, and I need to sharpen up the planes again, but all in all things are moving along.

I won't be in the shop for a few more days as I'm working up at my mom's house, putting in some new windows, but maybe I'll get in there this weekend if Abel doesn't have any work for me.  

Excellent Work

Today we installed the port side garboard strake.  When I say we, I mean JD and Drew were both in attendence.  No video conferencing, no Skype chat, but real, honest to goodness person to person collaboration.  It was excellent. 

Yesterday we glued on the starboard strake.  The aft end had a moderate gap around the transom and we just filled that full of epoxy.  I think it will be great. 

The port side was a little more problematic since we broke off both of our little drill bits while drilling pilot holes.  Without a car we started to get nervous since we had already spread epoxy basically everywhere.. but we called Steph who saved our freaking asses and went to the hardware store and picked up bits.  See figure 2.1

Thinking About Oars

JD will be here soon to help with installing the garboards.  I haven't been in the boat shop much since they've been finished, but I've been doing some research into oars.  

I've found a few recomendations for the leverage ratio an oar should have, but the concensus seems to be that you should find an oar that is comfortable and moves your boat along well.  So much for formulas.

Maybe instead of jumping into building three sets, I'll build one set at a time so we can test them.

Planning

Yesterday I planned.  I thought about the planking process, what we'll need, and the steps that happen after that.  I got to thinking about the rudder, which I lofted (drew full size) on the table and changed a little from the pattern.  I thought about the centerboard and centerboard case, and the decks that will be substantially different than those the designer calls for in the plans.  

I'm waiting for JD Ross to come up from San Francisco so we can attatch the garboards together.  It's a two person job.  In the meantime I might be able to get a start on the oars.  We're going to need six of them, three pair,  and that's a lot of work.

The New Table, The New Garboard, The News on Scarphing

I built this huge table for laying out the planking and gluing it.  It's made of a 4' x 10' sheet of 1" MDO.  It's plywood that has a leveled surface that's covered with paper.  It's easy to draw on, and really smooth and flat.  I was hoping it would be a little stiffer, but it's good enough for a gluing surface.  The half sheets are light enough to move around easily by myself, so I unscrew them from the horses and double them to make a stiff enough surface for scarphing.

I glued the port garboard scarphs today.  I'm definitely getting better at it.  I think that these ones are going to turn out pretty well.  Better than the last seven anyway.  Maybe by the time we get to the sheer strake I'll be expert at this plywood scarphing thing.

The most important things I've learned are things that I "knew" already.  The subsurface (the bench or whatever the scarphed objects are sitting on) really has to be perfectly flat, at least the part directly under the scarphing zone and a bit past.  Otherwise the plane will bridge over the low spots or take too much off the high spots.  The clamping strip that's nailed or screwed through the scarph should really be exactly the width of the scarph.  It's also nice to wrap the strip in plastic and staple it on so there's no plastic flapping around, allowing a clear view of the joint once it's clamped.      

A Visit From Andy

Our old friend Tetris Wassertron visited the boat shop today.  Helped clean up a little, and kept me company while I slowly moved ahead with the port garboard.

Port.

Last week I patterned and constructed the starboard garboard.  So far this week I've fixed my mistake at the stern, and begun preparations for the port garboard.

I'm not sure exactly how it happened, but the plank that I made for the starboard side ended up a little short from top to bottom in the stern.  Yesterday evening I added a piece to that section, which I faired in today.  So the starboard side fits now.  When the boat is all planked and we turn her over, I think we'll probably want to add a stringer along that seam from the transom to frame number six to shore up the small joint and ensure structural integrity.

As I suspected, the plank that now fits on the starboard side doesn't exactly fit on the port side, meaning the boat isn't exactly symetrical.  Hopefully this minor asymetry won't affect the tracking and handling of the vessel too much when she's in the water.  I think the effects will probably be neglegable as the disparity is within an eighth from one side to the other.