Decks, splashguards and spar planning

With winter approaching, I have been winding down the work on the boat (as opposed to spars, oars, centerboard and rudder, which I will make in the basement, and sails, which I will sew in the house), and on Sunday I cleaned up the garage for the season.  I was amazed how many small or narrow, useless scraps of plywood I had left over, but that's what you get with all the curved and irregular pieces.

Meanwhile, the weather in Ohio is holding, and yesterday we had almost 70 degrees (over 20 Celsius).  Not for much longer, that's for sure.  But since it's reasonably mild still, I first put on the side decks and sanded their edges and those of the foredeck smooth.  Then I marked and cut the splash guards.  The forward one is nailed and glued on the main bulkhead, protrudes 1.5 inch over the foredeck, and fits around the upper rail of the forward sliding door.  The side splash guards start forward at 1.5 inches over the side decks and end at about 3/4 inch at the transom.  I glued and nailed them onto the side deck vertical boards.  If you look closely at the picture, the splash guards are a little irregular and will require a little planing/sanding to smooth the curves.  This comes from cutting them free-hand with a circular saw.  I could have invested in a scroll saw but did not see the need beyond this one-off job.  I intend to put on the oak rubrails at the sheer this week.

If my luck with the weather holds I might do some finishing on the decks.  Finishing benches and inside bottom will probably wait for the spring, when I complete the flooring.  I am looking forward to taking a bit of a break from this frantic race with time and climate.  The auxiliary (winter) work will start soon enough.  Speaking of that, some words about what is planned:

Last weekend I bought the lumber for masts, yards and oars.  Good, clear, knot-free lumber is surprisingly expensive, but using stock white pine studs like I did in the past is a real pain, with all the knots and voids, and not very strong.  I designed the masts based on calculations from free software (Mast by Robert Tyrrell).  They will be laminated from three layers of 1X3 clear pine (3/4 by 2.5 inch in actual measurements).  The mainmast will be about 12 ft (3.66 metres) and the mizzen 11 ft 7 in (3.53 metres).  Both will easily fit inside the boat.  The diameter will be 2 1/4 inches (57 mm) at the partners, with some tapering above and below.  With all the scarfing, lamination, trimming, tapering, cutting the corners into octagonal cross-section, final rounding and finishing, the masts will be a lot of work.  Yards, by contrast, will be easy: two layers of 1x2 inch pine (3/4 by 1.5 inch in actual measurements) glued together, and some rounding of the corners.  As for the sprit booms, I already have one from a previous rig, and the second will be the same: a piece of closet rod with an epoxy and varnish finish.  Then of course I will have to get all the beautiful and perplexing chandlery of rigging: blocks, cleats, line, etc. for halyards, snotters, sheets and more.  I am a thrifty guy, and the boat will have traditional, unstayed, sturdy, simple rigging, so high-strength, high-performance, expensive stuff will not be necessary.  I have taught myself splicing, servicing and other marlinspike skills which will come in handy.  There will be plenty of posts about all that, of course.

The oar shafts will be made of two layers of 1X2 poplar stock, and the blades will be clear pine edge-glued to the shaft and its extension in the middle.  There will be quite a bit of rounding and tapering, planing and sanding.  I will also leather the place where the oars meet the bronze oarlocks, and add what is called a button to each oar so it doesn't slide out.  I will talk about the sails another time.

So keep an eye out for more adventures on 176inches.

boatbuilder