Companion Way Blues

While most of my companionway work was done between other work, I thought it best to present this as a category unto itself.  Much like the age-old corporate argument of whether or not to organize your minions by geography (North America vs. Europe), product (Widgets vs. Bludgets), or functional group (Marketing vs. Finance), I've decided to pull all of my companionway work together -- until next week when we can fire Mark from Marketing.

Last left, the companionway had just been cut from patterns supplied by CLC*.  This went swimmingly, and before long I had all 10 sides plus a couple handles cut from random bits of padauk, marine plywood, and pine.

One thing I'll share is that I really had no idea how this was going to work.  The plans didn't make this out to be a big deal, but being unfamiliar with the carpentry involved, I thought this was way more complicated than it turned out to be.  So like anything that's a bit of a challenge, I procrastinated as long as possible.  I think the manual has this done before the first flip.  Out of excuses, it was time to buckle down and do this.

Before assembly, I put in a couple blocks towards the forward part of the side planks.  I'm not sure what the use of this is as the slide still goes pretty far forward so this little bit doesn't really stop it from going anywhere.  Nevertheless, blocked up they are. This was allowed to cure and then sanded back smooth.

 

I then scored the forward part of the companionway hood.  This is a much larger piece than it looked with just an eyeball.  It crosses 2/3 of the entire cabin and stops just as few inches from the dorade cowls.  The rake, too, wasn't easy to get right.  All four sides angle in some way.  The method here was similar to what I did for the floorboards: a rough cut, then small shaves with the sander until it fit.  Getting this to fit right took the longest of any part of the companionway build.  Eventually I was satisfied with it.  The long, thin board here is holding it in place.

With all four sides cut, it was then time for the assembly.  It was a bit of a pain to be sure everything was square.  Other bloggers and I believe even CLC screwed the companionway sides onto board to keep things square.  I think that works if you're going to fill the holes and paint over them, but I was (and still am) planning to keep the sides bright so holes would not do.

To solve that, I built a small brace out of scrap wood and then clamped this between the two long ends of the hood.  (While the photo below is much later, you can see the brace to the left of the photo.)  This worked really well to stabilize the wobble but still allowed adjustments if needed, unlike a couple screws.  Most importantly, there are no holes in the hood so I can keep that smooth finish.

It's a little hard to see in the photo but it's basically just a stick screwed onto two flat boards, each about the size of a playing card.  This little contraption was then clamped onto the aft ends of the hood.

While the hood cured, I put together the slide.  Small 90 degree blocks were used in each corner to stay square.  Note the marine plywood forward and aft.  While this is definitely thinner than the 1/4" it calls for in the plans, there aren't any structural issues, and as I find out later, it's good to have a small profile here just in case things don't quite fit.

Before fitting the cover, I brought the slide over to the boat for a test.  Worked well enough.

And then brought the hood over with the slide between.  For the first time, I saw how it all fit together.  It was snug but workable.  To help with the action, I ordered some graphite to mix in with the epoxy for the slides, especially the sills.

 

In thinking about the "roof" of the cabin, I always thought it would be neat to have some art 'glassed into companionway slide. Lying down right before sleep, this is one of the last things I'd see. I spent too long online looking for the right design.  Nothing really caught my eye.  I finally settled on one of those olde thyme maps, and in fact I ordered a small poster, but it wasn't going to get to the house for another few weeks, so that wasn't going to work.  That afternoon, while going fabric shopping with my wife -- I'd spent so much time in the garage lately I felt a little guilty -- I found it:  a southern sky star chart.

It's not a perfect fit, and I later learned that the white fabric picks up the red of the padauk too much, turning the southern sky into a decided shade of pink, but it's good enough. I give myself an A for the idea and a B for execution, which is a high water mark.

The legs of each of these (hood and slide) need to be angled to accept the rake of the "ceiling."  This was short work with the belt sander, though utmost care is needed so as not to take too much off.  The hoods for both pieces are part of the kit and overhang the sides on purpose.  This is to allow for some tolerance in the build.  This tops went on pretty easily with some careful pre-drilling and then wood screws which were removed once cured.  You need to epoxy the handle on at the same time as this helps set the curve, though it wasn't until much later that I discovered I put the handle facing the wrong way.  I get that this is one of those things no one is going to notice but me, but I'll notice this every single time I open the hood.  Sigh.

 Once cured, a quick run with the router cleaned up the edges.

  

There was a lot of squeeze out on the inside of this, so much so that I put it aside for a couple days as I couldn't bear to sand any more.  I'd exhausted all of the other side projects I could think of (at least the ones I was willing to do, as cleaning up this squeeze out ranked still-higher than sanding the paint off the cockpit decking -- more on that later.)

Finally it was time for some 'glass.  The 'glass lays evenly across the top and then down about an inch off the bottom of the side.  There are a couple darts cut into this so it also lays forward (the rear of the hood) and in front.  I was able to get this over the handle and down, so I feel pretty good about the strength here.

 

Something told me I should only do the top of the hood so that's all I did at first, and I'm glad I listened to my intuition.  While everything seemed to be measured well, each additional layer of epoxy under the hood meant a wider and wider diameter for the part.  When this finished curing, I found I wasn't able to slide anymore as the top of the slide was hitting up against the forward port corner of the hood.

The only way I was able to fix it was to sand through a couple layers of plywood in the hood to free up enough material so the slide could slide.  I also took off a layer on the slide itself.  Finally, after a LOT of wrangling, I was able to get the slide to slide under the hood with very little resistance.

None of this will be visible and there is definitely a small structural component lost by the thinner plywood.  However, a set of solar panels will be here and no one should be stepping on this so I think it'll be OK.

You can also see the black of the graphite + epoxy on the sills.  This is also in the area where the slide rests on the deck.  I didn't think it would be this dark; it throws off the aesthetic.  I'll have to clean this up before final presentation and I'm not exactly sure what this will look like yet.

 

 

* I eventually found those patterns I thought I'd lost long ago.  At hole 14 on a golf course here in Muscat, I couldn't wedge my pitching wedge back in my golf bag.  I looked in and there were the rolled up, slightly musty plans.  These must've been here since I packed for Nigeria in late 2014, and let's just say there wasn't much golf to be had in Nigeria.  I've no idea why I thought that was a good place for them, and who knows why I thought I'd remember where I put them.

Companionway and Grab Rails

I made a lot of sawdust today.  Most of my millwork gets done in the backyard where I've converted a 6-foot party table into my main workbench.  My wife let me borrow this because there aren't any parties during these "special times" unless you count the wildlife which occasionally stops by to criticize my work.

Some work gets done in the driveway, too.  In fact, most of the table saw work gets done there in full view of the neighbors.  They already think I'm crazy from the days I was studying Arabic for fun so the image of a ~16' boat and its perky bowsprit doesn't faze them at all.  I try to keep a low profile but it's nearly impossible the way this boat has taken over my life lately.

Between bouts of sanding (which are visible in some of the photos below where the starboard side got some sanding love) I finally got around to working on the companionway.  This begins with a few 1" x 1/2" strings of lumber serving as the "sill" which the manual states will keep the cabin dry.  Makes sense.  One nice thing about this is most of it will be buried in the slide and then the hood so I didn't necessarily need to be perfect here, just neat enough.  More importantly, it needed to be watertight and flush with the entrance to the cabin.

 

This work was easier done while standing in the cabin, but I'd pulled the liftouts long ago so I was unnecessarily straddling the bilge and cleats.  I popped out of the boat, found the liftouts, and re-installed them.  Wow, they look great!  I then tossed some newspaper down to catch any epoxy drips.  That was the most use I've gotten out of a newspaper since I ran out of toilet paper on that road trip.

A dry fit of the milled pieces went well, but an interesting thing to mention in this photo is that the top (forward) strip and the left (port) one were milled before I set all this aside.  I found them a couple weeks ago but didn't know what they were for until I made the starboard strip.  This is why in the photo starboard is so much longer because I thought I was making two.  It turns out the one I made ~6 years ago was in good shape and a better angle so I kept it.  I then kept the better half of the new strip and now have all three pieces to form the sill.

A few weeks ago, I noted that the companionway opening sitting on the tire caused a bit of an inward bulge.  It's a half inch or so but noticeable.  With the forward sill in place with a clamp, the curve is once again true.  I'm not sure if it'll hold but stranger things have happened.

Three pumps of epoxy and some wood flour later, this is now curing with all of the clamps I could find in the house.  I had easily 4-5 times this many but they're all in storage.  Hopefully I won't need them in the next couple weeks.

 

Working backwards like Benjamin Button, I made the bigger companionway bits earlier in the afternoon, but this was not without drama.  In short, I have no idea where the patterns are for these bits.  I lost them in the move or thought they were scrap or thought they might burn well in my fire pit.  I posted on the forums and someone suggested I write CLC.  I thought about that but I felt like I was such a pain to them about the sailing hardware I didn't want to bother them.  After awhile, though, if I wanted to make progress, I had no choice but to reach out.

Within a day, John himself wrote me with a personalized, full size PDF for my missing pieces.  Wow!  Thanks, CLC.  I took it down to a print shop and a couple hours later was happily cutting out the patterns for my hood and slide.

 

I made the hood sides awhile back so they just needed some cleaning up with a little sanding jig before getting grooves with the table saw.

The forward facing bit of padauk has a fault in it.  I debated whether or not to show this or hide it.  In the end, I decided to show it; the hood sides and forward will stay bright.  It'll scream "real wood" and give the boat some character.  As I type that, it reminds me of a friend's grandmother who used to put little bits of shell in her crabcakes to prove they were made with real crab.  Some years from now when I've successfully sued her for half his inheritance I'll remind him that yes, Gramma made real crabcakes.

The slide itself is a simple bit of woodworking (especially with patterns -- thanks, CLC!).  The top piece is sanded down to its normal finish whereas the purple one is the darkened one.  Padauk is a reddish-brown in epoxy but more purple when exposed to air.

 

I'm also out of padauk or even pine that fit the specs so I used marine plywood for the aft and forward sides of the slide.  It'll still look good.

 

And then I decided to take a leap and try to make handrails.  The toerails on most PocketShips are minimalist, functional bits of timber that run along the outside edge of the cabin decking.  I think this would look good as padauk trim, but would look even better as grab rails.

I first scored the curve against a scrap bit of pine and transferred that to my last decent-sized bit of padauk.  A quick run with the jigsaw and I had two mirror strips of padauk.  These would be the tops.

After some discussion with myself, I decided that five, four-inch "feet" per rail would be functional and look good.  That meant cutting a third matching rail to create the 10 "feet' for the two rails.

 

A dry fit is promising.  This design has the added benefit of giving a place to hang things like fenders.  As an aside, I can't take credit for this idea.  I've seen it done on other boats but Jon's Solitude has the best photos so I'll give him the credit.

 

My plan is to get the hood and slide built and 'glassed today for an installation tomorrow.  I'm down to about 20 days left with very, very little time to spare.