Slow and Steady Wins a Gaff Rigged Pocket Cruiser?

The last few days haven't been terribly exciting on the boatbuilding front. Lots of very incremental advances which don't translate well to photos and blogging. Add that we got another 6 inches of snow last night, and it's been just overall depressing.

This April scene outside...

...translates to this scene inside. I feel you, Dylan!

I was in the shop last night epoxying cleats and I could feel the draft coming through the vent that leads outside. That's where the dryer used to pump its heated air out as exhaust. It's now the tube through which the occasional gerbil finds its way into my house to die a slow, agonizing death behind some cranny somewhere, as well as where I catch the breeze of a 90 degree wind. Good thing I'm using fast hardener because it was chilly down there, around 60 degrees.

While waiting for the cleats to cure, I turned my attention to the living room chair that every now and then turns into a living room throw pillow as the legs give out from underneath. If you're not interested in furniture repair, scroll down to the floor support photo. These chairs were some of the first things we bought with the new house a few years ago at a place called Wickes before they went out of business. Wickes specialized in furniture that looked nice but really wasn't. If I knew then what I knew now, I'd second guess these chairs... but then again, they were cheap, so maybe not.

In the photo below, keen observers will notice that there are box tail joint slots in this corner, but there are no box tail joints. Note: box tail joints work better when it's actually a joint. The problem is without something between the screw and the leg itself (in other words, where the box tail should be) the screw would just keep pulling against the chair leg until it finally ripped free of the connection, sending the sitter to the floor in a heap. No fun.

Box tail slots without the box tail joint = ultimate hecho en china fail.

The corner is rather complicated and I wasn't interested in extending the life of these chairs THAT much, so I simply made a small template from scrap ash, drilled a couple holes, and used that as support for the fasteners. The hole was drilled slightly smaller than the diameter of the screws so there's some grip there, too.

View of the angle. This should extend the life another few months.

Epoxy!! Where'd that come from?

I molded some epoxy into the shattered leg and clamped it shut. It holds pretty well. I should end this little diversion by saying my wife isn't terribly happy with how industrious I've become, as I've now extended the life of these chairs at least twice, reducing her ability to justify going out and buying new chairs. She will win this little engagement eventually, as all wives tend to do.

Back to Pocketship!  Here are the floor supports with their first layer of epoxy on them.

Floor supports 4, 5, and 6 looking fine.

I glued the cleats on earlier, gave them all a quick sanding, and cut their angles. Getting the angles wasn't too tricky but not without some work, either. The cleats are meant to be cut a little long, glued, then fitted to the angles of each floor support. The floor support angles are so extreme they're no good in the miter saw. I wound up taking the miter saw to them anyway to get close, then thought to use a flush trim bit with the router to get flush.

More and more, I don't like flush trimming. In what has become too common, the router's prickly and sensitive nature didn't always cut flush -- the straight edge that the bearing rolls against must be absolutely straight or else it will translate into the working piece. Of course, that happened a couple times so I have some wavy lines on the cleats where they won't fit flush against the bilge panels without heaps of epoxy. I managed to get most of them straightened out but not without more time spent sanding. I gave up on the router and got them close with the miter saw and sanded it down. That was a lot easier and much more accurate.

After trimming, they got a sanding and a quick layer of epoxy. I only did one half; I'll turn it over to do the other half tonight. I find that they dry better that way and it leaves less of a mess. I've cut the cleats for bulkheads 1 and 7 but haven't glued them on yet, as I wanted to get to the rudder first and there's not a lot of room in the shop for these large pieces. I should also point out that, owing to Dave's experience with separation at bulkhead 2, I plan to use ash for the timber vs. pine at bulkhead 2.

Cut, just waiting for the right moment.

With the floor supports curing, I figured I'd make progress on the rudder. It needs fillets, 'glass, and epoxy before it can get its pintles a year from now. I mixed up a batch of wood-flour epoxy for the first time. I like wood flour much better than cell-o-fill as it goes on smoother, causes less mess, and requires less of it to get the right consistency. I used a fat stainless steel tablespoon I got for 25 cents at a thrift shop to set the fillet in place (also my first major fillet).

A fillet to remember.

The plans call for "a monster" fillet here. Since I have no frame of reference as to what constitutes a "monster" I lathered this one thickly and evenly and was sure to get it into every area I could, as much as the frogtape would allow. Turned out pretty nice; we'll see how it acts under duress in the Gulf Stream some day. Really, I don't know if there's much difference in what I'd do here vs. the hull, for example, as anything less than "monster" implies "not monster" and "not monster" implies weak. At least that's the logic I'm going with.

Further, I can totally see where the peanut butter analogy comes into play. It really does look like peanut butter when it's all churned up. Given I ran out of peanut butter a couple nights ago, I'm very, very tempted to risk epoxy'ing my colon shut by adding this to my jelly preserves tonight.

Goes well with strawberry preserves.

A horrible photo of the rudder with fillets curing and the floor supports with cleats. Not visible is the tiller with the first layer of varnish on it.

We're supposed to be in the 60's over the weekend, something we haven't seen in a long time. By the calendar, it's closer to summer solstice than it is to spring equinox and there's snow on the ground. That just ain't right. We also got word that ice out might happen in the first week of May. Ice out, for those who live where there is no ice, is when the authorities allow boats in the water again. Ice out has not been into May for at least 30 years and records indicate it could've been 100 years ago since the last time. Strange things, indeed. Still, the warmer weather means I need to hop to the garage straightening and get that darn lead poured. With any luck, the hull could be together in a couple weeks.