Happy Anniversary - Flotation and Footwell

Today marks the one year anniversary of the kit getting dropped off at my house. I didn't know how far along I'd be a year from then. I knew that some people had boats in the water after 6 months. Others, after a year, barely had their keel assemblies done. In the end, it didn't really matter, as long as we eventually finish. I will share, though, that if not for the (self-inflicted) complicated electronics and the agony of the sole, I'd be much, much farther along.

My wife compared the PocketShip build to running a marathon the other day. I agree. The first and only marathon I ran was New York in 2006. The most I'd run before that was about 3 miles. Training took up too much time and heck, thousands of people run marathons every day. How hard can it be?

Turns out really hard. It was the dumbest thing I've ever done, and I've done some dumb things. I couldn't walk for a week and the accomplishment - 6 hours, 15 minutes - earned me a letter from the marathon organizers congratulating my finish as a special needs runner. I'm not kidding. Now, 26 miles over 6 hours averages to a little over 4 miles an hour, a slow jog, but still a jog over 6 hours, something I'd wager few people can wake up and do. I finished, though barely, and now have a good story to tell.

Same with PocketShip. The most impressive thing I'd built before this was a shaker table. It's a nice table, but it won't take me to the Isles. I also made a very nice cutting board. Fast forward a couple years and I just installed the footwell of my 16' foot sailboat. By this time tomorrow, I'll have the cockpit decking down, too. Suddenly, I won't have a bathtub in the garage anymore, but a boat, with a top, bottom, inside, and outside. It will truly be a three dimensional object, and a cozy one at that.

It took awhile to prep the transom for this day, something like six weeks. In between was getting the electronics ready and testing them fully since I won't see the bus bars again until I cut out the laz hatch sometime by 2018.  I laid out the protective paper and hiked down to the Big Box store for a couple 4x8's of the purple foam. It's 1.5" thick so just the right size. Of the three main types, it was also the most "water resistant". It's almost like this was made for a boat.

I had to cut it in half to get it home so the Big Box guy cut it for me. He asked what I was going to do with it since it obviously wasn't going to go behind any sheetrock. I said it's for flotation for my boat. He said, oh, I have a runner with a 100hp engine I'm fixing up. There's something about boats that connects people. Granted, I wouldn't take a runner with a 100hp engine if someone paid me but at least he was trying to make conversation as he cut up my insulation. I thanked him and secretly wished I never run into him in the water.

I got home and started carving. Keen readers will note I've got more-than-the-average stuff going on in my transom, so had to be careful about placement. My garage, too, is now littered with bits of purple insulation everywhere.

Flotation goes in. First of many.

Careful finagling to avoid the conduits and other things. This is starboard.

After about 30 minutes, I had the flotation sized and placed. One row is made up of offcuts as I had to really jam some flotation in there. It worked out well. I'm a little concerned about all the squeaking this stuff does. Only time will tell.

Flotation done in this area. The row second from left is made of offcuts. Couldn't quite get a full piece in there but managed to stuff it mostly full. I'll lay down more flotation left and right of this under the laz floors.

Once sufficiently stuffed, I took a break for dinner, came back, and formally installed the footwell sides and bottom. These have been sitting prepped for awhile now. Getting them onto the boat was exhausting due to the contortionist requirements, but one of the highlights thus far.

I then checked on the laz floors. These were cut from the pallet. I didn't want to use good plywood here as they will take a beating (I realize that's a bit of a contradiction....) but with some epoxy and paint they'll look decent enough and be able to support all the assorted crap I'll throw in the laz. I'll probably need to cut these away every couple years to access the transom bilge area, so again, didn't want to do too much of an awesome job here.

Laz floors cut from pallet plywood. 2nd layer of epoxy curing.

Test fit of laz floor. I like it! Keeps stuff off the conduits and foam, protects the hull, and looks good.

Doesn't go all the way across so I can still access stuff if I need to.

I haven't decided how permanent I want to make the laz floor. They're there to keep water off the bilge and to protect the conduit, pump, etc. But I'll need to remove them some day and don't want to muck up everything to do so. I'll probably loosely secure these with silicon to form a barrier between the floor and the footwell side (including a small 'weep hole' to drain water from here) and screw it down with a couple short stainless steel screws on the cleats. That'll be structurally sound yet still give maintenance flexibility if needed.

Other accomplishments include getting the 16' select pine from Menard's (6 planks for $140) and starting to order hull hardware. It's really, really coming together!