Framing continued

I haven't been able to do much recently, Winter is always a bit flat out with work, but towards the summer I should have a bit more time. I have made a little more progress with the deck framing though.



I have also started planning on the fittings and things.As i have almost nothing, i will probably get most things made up. I am designing a triangulated frame to take the stress of the mast step and chainplates a bit and hopefully spare the garboards around the mast step from any unnecessary stress.

Deck framing

Finally I've made a start on the deck frames.
The first part done was the sides of the cockpit. I had some kahikatea, the same that I used for the gunwales, left over, so the first job what to bend it around to find the right curve. I took measurements off the plan of Rona for the width of the side decks and just made a fair curve that was as close as possible to those measurements.

Once I had the line where I wanted it, I marked out the areas to cut out on the transom, aft beam and forward beam. The Spanish windlass held the curve while the glue dried, but once everything had hardened, the compression between the ends held the curve without any springback.

The next stage it to make the supports for the side decks. I got some old kauri form a house recycling place  called Musgroves in Christchurch. They've got lots of old wood and I found a nice wide board I could use. It was covered with paint and wallpaper, but after i got that off I found it was a very nice piece of wood.
So scribing around the planks, I made a cardboard template and then cut it out of the board. The first frame is on and only 5 to go. I glued and screwed it through the original holes with brass screws. I scraped the paint off where I would glue first of course

Inside paint done

I got the final coat on the inside, a gloss enamel. I've still to do the inside face of the transom, but I'll do that after all the framing for holding the traveller and things is in properly. I'll also put another colour on the forward supports around the mast step later too.

Painting the inside

progress this year....
I turned the boat over to make a start of finishing the inside. I have painted the inside in preparation for doing the deck framing. I'll put one more coat on, then start on the framing. I am thinking that if the framing is in place it is going to be pretty hard to reach in to get at the area around the centrecase. I'll turn it over again before i have finished, so i'll add a few more coats of varnish and tidy up the edges of the paint on the centrecase then. It is much easier to get to upside down....

wooden blocks part 2

I finished one block today, I can't wait to try it.
After last time, I let the block soak in linseed oil overnight, and this morning I fitted the sheave and peened over the sheave pin which snugged up the coin washers nice and tight.

I'm thinking of a few different types of rope for the strop. I got a small piece if sisal because it looks very traditional more than anything else, and it looked like an easier rope to splice than anything else that was half decent at the shop.

For my first go at splicing it wasn't as terrible as I feared. I made a loop to what I felt would be right, sliced it together, whipped the ends of the splice and stretched it a bit. I did the seizing for around the thimble first, then put the thimble in, and bound it all tightly.

 I'll try it out a bit first
before i use it on the

boat. It seems really firm and solid, but I guess the sisal will stretch to some extent. I'm wondering if soaking it in water or varnish will swell the fibres and make it a bit tighter and stronger.

If the sisal doesn't work out, it is only a matter of making another strop, so that is not a big worry.

The whole thing cost a total of around $6.50

Wooden blocks

This is the first post in a while as i haven't had time to do anything lately, but since I have a very short "holiday" I thought I could at least get started on some blocks. I was inspired by a few posts on the Wooden Boat forum and decided to have a go.

I found a particularly good looking and heavy piece of native Rimu, which is perhaps not ideal, but is quite a hard wood, so with some washers around the pin ends, I think it should hold up OK. My sheave is a shop bought delrin sheave and the pin is the shank off an old bronze bolt. I will use Japanese 5 yen coins for the washers at the pin ends because firstly I have a huge pile of them, and secondly in Japanese 5 yen, is said "go-en" which also means "valued relationship" or "valued connection". The coins are a copper and zinc alloy and they corrode to a nice copper green colour.

  

The first step was to cut the Rimu 4x2 down to the width of the block. I wasn't too fussy about the cut as it would be all rounded off later.

After cutting a rectangular block out, I drilled out the gap for the sheave, leaving enough space at either end for the rope to pass through. It was looking pretty ugly at this time, but after a bit of sanding and rounding off it looked quite good.

 
The next stage was to carve the bedding holes for the coin washers and file up the pin to fit the holes already in the coins. Another good thing about the 5 yen coin is that it already has holes in it so you don;t have to feel guilty about drilling holes in money. The rope strop will cover the pin and most of the coin anyway, but even so...

This is as far as I got today. I still need to cut the rope grooves longer and make up the rope strop for the block. I'll also soak the whole block in linseed oil before putting it together. I'll lightly peen the pin over at the ends just in case as well.

transom done

Here is the transom after 2 coats of varnish so far.
It has been glued on and the end grain sealed with epoxy.
I still need to tidy up the white paint and I'll continue the waterline around the aft end of the keel which will delineate the transom and the keel a bit. There will also be a capping around the top of the transom when the deck goes on and this will continue the line of the gunwales.