So another week has passed and we have spent out time fitting out a variety of different dinghies, basically putting in Deck Beams, Bulkheads, and Decking in 'miniature'.
Sadly, I do not have a full set of the photographs, but have included a few to give a sense of what we achieved, as it happens we were pleased with the outcome generally speaking and certainly from a personal point of view I learned a great deal.
Probably the principle thing I learned was that you cannot build a boat by committee, well actually that isn't strictly true, you can! However, it is somewhat slower than otherwise would be the case and with 6 individuals each pursuing their own ideas effective project management becomes an interesting exercise in damage control.
On the upside I have mastered (I use the word 'mastered' loosely) the half-dovetail beam joint; this is a joint that actually defies logic and while many drawings exist of its structure if you cut it the way it is drawn, it won't fit! It should, it just doesn't. It is when the beam should slide smoothly into its rebates across the beam of the boat that this realisation dawns; at this point you are told that you need to bevel off one face on one end of the deck beam... this of course then means that the joint has some large gaps...because you shouldn't have removed material from the female end of the joint before cutting the bevel that you didn't realise you needed to cut. Got that! The thing is you only make the mistake once.
I also had great fun spiling, scribing, and learned about the use of joggle sticks and dummy sticks, the fitting of carlins and half beams, bulkheads, and how to saw the end of the desk with a jigsaw because you didn't check the clearance before engaging the jigsaw, fortunately not my mistake... oh the joys of power tools.
As the boats have to be used by subsequent classes and they have to be able to remove what we have put in relatively easily, we were introduced to the hot glue gun, the boatbuilding equivalent of the tack weld. Unfortunately, we stuck a far amount in place using PU, it seemed a good idea at the time but with the wisdom of hindsight was probably a pretty anti-social gesture. We removed the last term's efforts by the application of Olaf's size 10 steel capped work boats; I think our successors will probably need a kango hammer.
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| Deck beams, carlins and half beams |
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| Coach House framing going on |
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| Christian's addition to the cockpit... Stage 1 |
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| Decking scribed and fitted |
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| Stage 2 |
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| Decking complete |
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| Coamings and parsnips in place with coach roof trunking |
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Finished but for the coachroof...
So the end of an eventful and fun filled week, this weeks tool of choice - the hot glue gun
Next week we are working with GRP and resins building our first exam piece in the form of a model boat...
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