Canaries in a Coal Mine - Transom Prep 3

Another PocketShip builder (Jon) talks about his metaphorical canary to gauge how much time's been spent building versus other hobbies. Miners took canaries into the shafts with them to test for gas. (Some of them got pick axes, too, but they were terrible workers.)

Apparently, canaries are much more susceptible to gas than humans are, so if the bird keeled over, it was time to head to the surface. In Jon's case, it was violin proficiency. In my case, it's bagpipe practice. For all I know, Jon's bird is still alive. Mine has long since crumbled into a pile of feathers and mulch.

I haven't picked up the pipes in about 2 months, favoring boatbuilding over most other winter hobbies. I've been forced (in a good way) to pull out the practice chanter and work on some St. Patrick's tunes. I don't do the parades and bars anymore, but I do work with a Dropkick Murphy cover band that plays tunes like An Irish Pub Song, Shipping Up to Boston, and a not-your-grandmother's Amazing Grace.

That means PocketShip progress has been slow. Some days, it's walking into the garage, staring at the transom, and walking back out. Other days, like yesterday, it was cutting a 9" cleat and letting it sit with some epoxy on it. Speaking of epoxy, one task I had to do before anything else was replacing the 5 gallon resin jug. There was still some left in the old jug, so I poured the remnants into the new one. If progress can be measured by material use, then there's been some progress. Granted, half the jug wound up on the shop floor, or scraped off the tiller, or in various globs around the house, but some of it actually made it onto the boat. There's a lot left in the build, but I should have enough to finish.

New resin jug. Hard to believe.

Some little things to address included the final board for the sole. I'd stripped too much wood from the cleat so had to refill it with epoxy and drill the board back in. The sole is officially planked and finished. I'll need to do some touch up work just before launch (some minor sanding and varnish) but that'll wait until much later.

Had to refill holes to redo the last plank.

The sole is done!

Finishing the sole was a bit anti-climatic. From hauling the padauk home to the final plank installed, it was about 10 months. From ripping the first plank, about 6 months. I really like the way it came out - it's stunning, actually - and I'm surprised this is a product of my handiwork. But it was a long way to get here with the accent boards, lift out design, and angles. This was one of those high effort, high reward things, like college, but I wouldn't want to go back. I'm ready to move on.

I also finished up the port speaker box. Keen readers will recall I dry fit these last time. They're now installed with epoxy and drywall screws. It's flush all around and watertight. The backer was installed just outboard of the top cleat that forms the frame for the laz hatch. That's important for how the laz floor is going to work. A very small hole is visible in the upper right where the wires will power the speakers. I'll also install a bus bar at the upper right corner of the backing to carry the port side wires under the footrest and to the starboard side, where it will carry forward to the battery. This is needed because I didn't think ahead enough to leave a few more feet of wire.

I'm slightly concerned about how the current will affect the speaker; will I get a buzz? Not sure, but not really many options right now.

Screwed and glued and watertight port side speaker box. Will also be the bus bar surface.

View from the cabin. The angle of the screw holes annoys me even in this photo.

View from the top. You can see the extra blocking added for the speaker depth. There's about 1/2" clearance now.

Starboard always gets the dregs, and here again is no exception. I epoxy'd the last cleat in place and will wait for that to cure before installing the backing later this afternoon. This one was a little finicky as the bottom cleat (for the laz floor) was a slightly different size than the others, so had to taper the speaker box cleat. Came out fine, just a little work to get right. It gave me an excuse to try the tapering jig, which will be important when I do the scarfs for the rubrails. Man! There's a lot to this boat.

Starboard speaker box lagging behind.

I worked with the footwell sort of dry fit. This was to ensure I wasn't off on the dimensions and to understand how to run the wires.

Footwell dry fit. Nice clean lines. This is one pretty boat.

A couple things to note. There will be flotation under the floorboard, and indeed under the laz floors, too. Some of that space under the floorboard is taken up by the bilge pump and the wiring conduits, so I'll need a little extra flotation to make up for the cubic foot or so I'll lose for those things. Given I'll have both port and aft side electrical needs, I need to be sure I can run wires back and forth under this without causing a mess. I also need to be sure I have access to everything. That means I won't have 100% coverage on the laz floor but really just the area between the inboard speaker box edge and the footwell itself. I'll have a short baffle (for lack of a better word) that will sit vertically between the footwell side and the hull. It's a good compromise, I think. But we'll see how it works in practice. Pictures later will help anyone who's confused, including me.

A side project I've been working on is a redo of the dashboard. With a little time and energy, I recut the pattern and added some extra flair to the border. I don't think it'll be installed until I turn the boat back over, but at least it'll be ready when that time comes. Now, back to the pipes!