April 21 / 2007

I finally am back from urchin diving . This was the worst winter I remember in my 20 + years of diving . I did still catch a few fish when we weren't working .

When I finished for the season and got home I went straight to the wood store and bought a bunch of 9mm okume marine ply and some really good clear fir for stringers.

when I opened up my shop after 5 months of wet weather I was amazed at the mildew and worst of all my transom had completely cupped in . I spent hours sanding and pondering over what to do with my solid wood transom and in the end I removed it and am scuttling it . I think my main problem was casing . I epoxyed doublers on the forward side of the transom and the aft side of the transom was unfinished. Any way another lesson learned the hard way.

The unfortunate warped transom... A great piece of shop art that I will hang proudly from the rafters.... It only took over 10 hours labour  and hundred dollars worth of mahogany......
A picture of the not so glamorous but straight plywood transom installed in its home. my path finder is now about 3/4 of a inch shorter  because the other transom was that much thicker .... Who will know!
I have no Idea if this is the best way of putting up stringers but it is the way I am doing it ..I could of got long enough wood so I wouldn't have to scarf but transport and also trying to mill 20 foot long 2 inch fir by myself did not seem practical so I at first thought I would scarf but it has been a little to cold where I live for epoxy to cure properly unless I was willing to wait day's for glue to dry so my scarf's kept failing .. any way what I did was make stringers in 2  10 mm pieces and laid them butt to butt in a brick like fashion and tuck taped them together with lots of epoxy  ...It took three hours to glue clamp screw and glue one top stringer into place.. with no assistance.   

 
 Ready for the other side
A few more stringers added.. I am getting  faster as I add each stringer.. I am stubborn and want to make this boat with no help, but friends would make this job easer.
The stringers are installed  ... This seems Like a small milestone in my boat. I really can see the shape and certain things about how the boat is put together are really clear to me now.
 
 
I have started to bevel the chine stringer to the first bottom stringer so that the plank as a flat landing... I am using my angle grinder which used with care is very quick and remarkably accurate.. As you can see it is a very dusty, dirty job but I love it . .   I will follow with my hand plane... ... On the stringers above my head I had to add a 5 mm strip to the stringers to make it sit out far enough as I cut my groove a little to deep ..those are screws holding it into place till my glue dries....

 

After doing this for a while my love for this sone died a dirty death and I bought a power planer and used a combination of grinder/planner and hand planner ...

 

from now on I will always build  a boat upside down if at all possible ... I wanted to try it this way but having built a boat upside down I can say it is a way easier that way
   

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