Problems and progress

Getting the materials was a real pain, since we live in a small mountain village on an island, far from regular supply routes. Plus we don’t even have a street address, full time post office or home mail delivery (thanks, Hellenic Post, I remember when you were a service that made us proud; now, not so much). Plus, as far as I can tell, nobody ever builds boats on their own, so sourcing materials as a DIY consumer (as opposed to a boat yard) is tough. I had to contact a manufacturer/exporter of marine plywood to get the right stuff, and they sold me the sheets wholesale as a favor. The epoxy and related materials ended up in a similarly named island 400 miles away literally at the other end of the Aegean Sea due to someone mishearing my call. Anyway, I managed to get what I needed after dozens of phone calls and lots of waiting.

Another problem is that I have no enclosed workspace, workbench or many tools. I am building the boat in a sheltered part of our terrace under a large roof overhang. We are now being affected by a medicane (that’s a Mediterranean hurricane, who knew such things existed?) named Zorbas, with lots of wind and bands of rain, and so far the work area has stayed dry and safe. I am using four rather flimsy sawhorses for the cutting and backbone building phase, and I will secure the backbone and frames to a strongback secured on top of the sawhorses. It helps a lot that the tops of the CB trunk and four of the frames are exactly 16 inches (403mm) above the bottom line of the boat, because of the tops of seating benches and rowing thwart.

Completed so far:

1. Scarfed two sets of 6mm (1/4 inch) sheets of plywood together. Without proper tools (only a hand plane and palm sander) I ended up with scarfs that look terrible but are strong and will look better after a thorough sanding.
2. Marked and cut all the keel and stem pieces and centerboard sides. A lot harder than it sounds, starting from measurements on a piece of paper. Also cut a mockup of the centerboard from hardboard to make sure it fits and pivots correctly.
3. Since I don’t have a table saw, I had to ask a carpenter friend to cut a few boards into straight and beveled cleats.
4. Glued and nailed garboard cleats onto stem, skeg and CB trunk sides.
5. Cut and fit spacers for the insides of the CB trunk. Making space for a sheave for the lifting of the centerboard proved particularly picky.
6. Cut transom, fore bulkhead and mid bulkhead from 12mm plywood. Four more frames (one temporary) will be cut from 8mm plywood.

I only have just over five weeks before we leave (helping with another grandchild on the way, in Spain this time, then winter in Sacramento), so I hope to have to hull put together but not epoxied or painted. That, plus flipping the boat over and completing benches, decking etc. will have to wait until I come back. I will sew the sail in the US and bring it over.

The new design

The design of the new, unnamed boat is very similar to Aerie’s: marine plywood, v-bottom, four strakes per side, 176 inches long. It has some important changes in the structure and sailing equipment, all born of experience:

1. It is built around a three piece backbone consisting of keel/skeg, keel/stem and centerboard trunk all joined together, with the keel made of two layers of 12mm (half inch) plywood. Instead of a keel batten, garboard cleats are glued and nailed to the keel and CB trunk. 
2. Another important modification is the design of the centerboard, whose pivot bolt is positioned on the keel under the hull, to prevent leaks through the pivot hole. The centerboard is wider and the CB trunk is almost completely enclosed, with a small corner opening for the line and blocks for raising and dropping the centerboard. This will prevent water from splashing into the boat. The centerboard will be weighted with lead, both so it can drop easily and for ballast below the waterline when lowered. The CB was designed in tandem with the sail for a balanced helm, using techniques learned from David Nichols' The Working Guide to Traditional Small-Boat Sails.
3. For simplicity, the boat will be a cat with a single sprit sail. This way there will be no halyards (the sail will be permanently laced to the mast), no boom and only three lines: a sheet clipped to the clew, a snotter for the sprit and a brailing line for dousing the sail in rough weather. Again, thanks to David Nichols for many ideas. This being a sea-going vessel (albeit in the Mediterranean and very close to land for beach hopping only), a small outboard and oars will be on hand for when the wind is too weak or too strong.
4. The fact that I am building a cat means that there is only one forward bulkhead, at 28 inches (711mm) aft of the stem of the boat. The mast partner will be secured to this bulkhead and the foredeck.
5. The new boat has a bit less freeboard. I found that Aerie had too much, especially for the purpose of fitting an outboard. An added bonus is that the long hull pieces (garboard & strakes) will fit on two pieces of plywood (scarfed together) per side.
6. There will be a bit less in the way of seating and no lockers (again for simplicity). Instead there will be four storage compartments with open access ports cut into the bench risers. In addition, there will be three buoyancy compartments (fore of the transom and under the foredeck and rowing thwart) filled with expanded polystyrene. I got tired of relying on watertight compartments for buoyancy: they never are fully watertight and are a pain to drain and dry after water gets into them. I will make sure that the compartments have drainage holes. 
7. There will be no floorboards, which proved to be an annoyance on Aerie. Instead I will reinforce the bottom with extra plywood strips and finish it with anti-slip grit.

At it again

It’s been years since I posted on this blog, and lots of things have happened. I considered shipping Aerie to Greece, but it was way too expensive, enough to pay for the materials for two or three new boats. Plus the paperwork for getting it through customs and registering according to European Union regulations would have been a nightmare. So I decided to build another one in Greece instead, which is not surprising since I love to build things.

Meanwhile, I retired in April 2016. The plan to stay in Greece full time was put aside, on account of our children and their hoped-for offspring. We planned to move to California to be near our younger daughter, and spend up to half the year in Greece. I considered selling or giving Aerie away, but was talked out of it by members of the Wooden Boat forum that live in the Sacramento area. So we dragged the boat and its trailer over the Rockies, with a nasty incident in Albuquerque where the rear window of the SUV was smashed and random stuff taken. I could blame Aerie for it, since the length of the car plus trailer forced us to park in the one area not covered by security cameras and right next to the fence to boot. But I don’t blame the boat really; thieves are mean idiots who will steal anything they can, causing $500 worth of damage (not to mention the replacement cost of what they stole) for a duffel bag of clothes and such, with a street value of maybe $30. Breaking Bad was right, Albuquerque must be full of meth-heads drugged out of their minds!

Anyway, Aerie made to Sacramento, where she spent a while in storage and now sits in the back yard, without much opportunity for outings since we spend summers in Greece. But she is still beautiful and works just as well. But now, one grandbaby later, it was time to build one in Greece. It’s cutting into my bagpipes practice (that's another story), but you can’t have everything.