Love Me Tender, Volume IV



You never know when it's coming, but you know it's coming.  It's the boat building disaster.  Every boat construction project has one: a mistake, slip, error, or accident of such  magnitude that is appears that there is no way to recover, at least not without hours upon hours of rework and substantial expenditure of additional funds.  Coping with this moment is the true test of a boat builder's skill, ingenuity and emotional resiliency.

I managed to finally get up the gumption to get out and do the sanding that I wanted to get done before stitching together the hull of my Eastport Pram.  My motivation level shot up, as I could now enjoy that single most rewarding part of stitch and glue boat building, stitching, where in just a few short hours the hull of a boat emerges from a pile of plywood. 

Indeed, I quickly stitched the first set of planked to the bottom.  It was getting a little late in the evening, but I figured I would spend a few more minutes and get the added boost of getting the second set of planks started.  That's when I noticed it.



The rabbet should have been where my finger is.
But it's not.

John C. Harris, owner of Chesapeake Light Craft, designer of the Eastport Pram, and author of the very fine set of instructions that comes with the boat, issued stern warnings about this, and I sure tried to heed those warnings.  Yet something went wrong.  You see, the Eastport Pram is what Chesapeake Light Craft markets as a "lap stitch" boat, in other words a stitch and glue boat that has the appearance of a lapstrake boat when it is done.  To accomplish this, a rabbet is cut into one edge of each plank.  However, this rabbet has to be along the right edge or the whole thing doesn't work.  And somehow, despite all the warnings in the instructions and in the plans about very carefully marking which edge gets the rabbet, I cut it wrong on the second set of planks.  Don't ask me how.
So, how did I deal with it?  Did I collapse into a piteous pile of despair?  Or, did I rise to the occasion in a solid display of boat building fortitude?

I despaired.



"Inlaying" wood in the bad rabbet.

All fixed up!

Then, I pulled myself together, and contemplated the various possible courses of action.  The first natural instinct of any boat builder is find recourse in epoxy, and indeed the very first thing that came to mind was to somehow fill the old rabbet with thickened epoxy and cut a new one.  This idea was quickly discarded however, as the practical question arose of how that much thickened epoxy would take to later being bent into a boat-like shape.  I also though about just cutting the new rabbet at leave then old one, though this got thrown out on both its aesthetic and structural implications.  Next idea...more plywood, cut new ones, increase total cost of materials some 20%.  OK, how about this one...find some 1/8" thick (the depth of the rabbet) color-contrasting wood, cut it to the right shape and inlay it in the old rabbet.  With any luck, it might even look intentional.  We have a winner.

A Little Matter of 20 Cents

I received an letter in the mail the other day from the Port of Edmonds.  Though I had stayed at the Edmonds marina on my first cruise, I couldn't imagine any reason that they'd want to send me a letter.  Did they lose my payment?  Were they angry with me about my liberal interpretation of the "Reserved" signs on the guest dock?  Were they thanking me for all the fame and fortune that my visit brought them?  I hurriedly opened the letter and found this:

Two dimes taped to an invoice.  When I registered at the Edmonds Marina, the moorage fee for Solitude III came out to $19.80.  As I had arrived after the port office closed, I enclosed a $20 bill with my registration card into the after-hours drop box.  I can't say I really cared about the 20 cents that I overpaid, nor was I expecting to get change! 

What I find particularly interesting is not that they returned my 20 cents, but that they spent 46 cents for postage to send it to me!

What's Cuter Than a Pinniped?

A baby pinniped, of course!

A mother harbor seal will often seek out a nice, safe spot for their pup to haul out while she goes off in search of food.  This little pup's mother has apparently come to the conclusion that a busy boat ramp is the perfect "safe place."

Bowsprit Cam

From the same people who brought you "Gaff Cam,"  here's a new view.

Small World

The Pacific Northwest has been suffering a heat wave recently.  Hoping to beat the heat, a friend and I went out sailing the other day.  A wise choice as it was cool enough on the water to actually enjoy a magnificent day!

I had forgotten to top up the fuel in the outboard's massive 1/4 gallon tank before leaving the dock, and we were just exiting the Snohomish River when fuel starvation struck.  As I bound towards the motor, jerry can in hand, I looked up and, much to my surprise, saw a Devlin Winter Wren bearing down on me.  I recognized her instantly, Nil Desperandum, with Captain Larry Cheek aboard.  Larry wrote about his experiences building Nil Desperandum, and reading his blog provided both motivation and a voice of sanity when I was building Solitude.   I've met Larry and his wife briefly in person and been aboard Nil Desperandum twice at the Wooden Boat Festival.  And now, here he was, circling his boat around me, asking if I needed help!   What a small world!  Thanks for standing by to render aid, Larry!

Fortunately, I was quickly able to splash of gas into the tank and  get the noisemaker up and running again.  Shortly thereafter, the engine was silenced again, this time deliberately, and my friend and I were enjoying a great day sailing!

Nil Desperandum, under sail.  Larry is modest about her, but she sure is a fine looking boat.

Weather or Not

The National Weather Service generates marine weather forecasts, including wind and wave conditions.  And this data is available everywhere.  On the weather radio, on the Internet, even on smartphone apps.  Before heading out sailing, I always check the marine forecast.  But I have no idea why.

The marine weather forecast actually "predicts" several days out, but these predictions, like most weather forecasts in the Pacific Northwest are so notoriously inaccurate that I am going to skip over complaining about these.   No, it the the "day of" predictions that I take issue with.  To start to understand the issue, let's take a look at an example of what the forecast actually looks like:

TODAY...S WIND 5 TO 15 KT...BECOMING NW IN THE AFTERNOON. WIND WAVES 2 FT OR LESS. A CHANCE OF SHOWERS.
TONIGHT...N WIND TO 10 KT. WIND WAVES 1 FT OR LESS.

You may think that the question here is one of accuracy, and indeed, I have been out on "WIND 5 TO 15 KT" days, and has it be dead calm.   Yet, this isn't the real issue.  The real issue is, even if this is accurate, how does it help me? 

You don't have to have spent much time sailing to know that there is a huge difference between a 5 knot wind and a 15 knot wind.  In fact, it is worse than it looks, because the force the wind exerts on the sails isn't proportional to the wind speed, but rather the wind speed squared.  So, at 15 kts, the wind is exerting 9 times the force on the sails that it was at 5 kts!   As a side note, the force on the sail is directly proportional to sail area.  So, to maintain the same force on the sails, if the wind speed triples, you'd have to reduce sail area to 1/9th of what it was.

For Solitude III, 5 knots of wind means trimming out the sails, leaning back, lounging in the cockpit, sipping iced coffee, as the boat calmly glides over the water.  On the other hand, 15 kts means you'd better have a reef in, crew aboard, and desire to thrash about in exciting conditions.   I'll go sailing in 5 kts of wind all day, any day.  But, honestly, though sailing Solitude in 15kts of wind is a lot of fun, seldom do I want to go out in those conditions singlehanded! So, how does telling me that the wind will be 5 to 15 kts help me?

Likewise, what does WIND WAVES 2FT OR LESS mean?  Wind waves of 2 ft make for a pretty bumpy ride on a boat like Solitude.  But, according to the forecast, the wave may be less that 2 ft...they may be 1 ft waves, or the sea may be glassy calm.  Aside from assuring me that (assuming an accurate forecast) conditions won't be so rough that  I'll be risking life and limb if I go out, I again must ask, how does this help me? 

I could continue.  What exactly do you mean by "AFTERNOON" or "TONIGHT?"  "A CHANCE OF SHOWERS."   How big of a chance?  Give me something, anything. 

Love Me Tender, Volume III

Every time I have built a boat, there has come a point where progress ground to a halt for weeks or longer.  Every time.   Looking back on this, there are a couple of key factors that lead to crossing the event horizon into the boat building black hole.  First, usually there's some sanding that needs to be done on the project.   Also, the weather usually is improving and other activities start competing for my time...hiking, kayaking, house 'n garden maintenance, maybe even getting out sailing in my newly completed PocketShip, Solitude III.   In any event, my desire  to spend time in the garage working is severely diminished.  And knowing that all I have to look forward to is sanding....

This is currently the case with the Eastport Pram project.  I have several epoxy-covered planks sitting there waiting to be sanded.   After about an hour of sanding, I would be able to start stitching the hull togother and have the enormous boost of seeing the boat quickly come together.  Indeed, in the interest of making progress, and getting that big morale boost, I've even been tempted to skip sanding all together...just get the hull together now and sand later.  But sealing and sanding the interior of the planks, while the are still flat, accessible, and easy to sand is the entire reason that I could decide to seal them in epoxy before stitching!  I don't want to have to sand the inside of the boat once it is stitched.  No way.

Elliot Creek Falls

So, for now, the project is sitting there, waiting for me.  Now, if you'll excuse me, it is time to go hiking...