Love Me Tender, Volume VIII

Many a boat builder has, at some point, become so frustrated with a boat that they just wanted to take a saw to it, slice it into a million little pieces and be done with it.  Some have even act on the impulse. But most pull themselves together in time to save that object on which they have invested so much time and effort.  On an unrelated topic, I just sawed my boat in half.

The good news is that this was not fit a fit of boat building rage, but rather part of the plan.  You see, the Eastport Pram that I am building is the nesting version.  The forward section is designed to be removed and nest in the aft section for storage and transport.  I current cannot imagine any need I have for this feature currently, but just thought it too fascinating not to build.

From the crispness of this picture, you can see how steady my hands were.

One would expect that sawing a nearly-complete boat in half would be a highly nerve-racking experience, but I did not find it too bad.  The only part that caused me any digestive uncertainty was in marking the cut line.  I took the cheater route there and bought a long, long, long 1/8" drill bit, which I then plunged through the spacer in the take-apart bulkhead and repeatedly drilled through the hull with.  While this resulted in a perfect series of dots that I could connect with the saw, the act of drilling holes in the hull was, for me, a test of sweaty-palmed fortitude.

After that, the actual event was a non-event.  I took up my handsaw, and voompa, voompa, voompa, done.  I loosened the 6 bolts on the takeapart bulkhead and the bow gently slipped off.  Unable to resist, I swung the bow section around and nested it in the aft hull.  Perfect fit, and a relative tidy package.

It nests!

It was a good thing too, because the smaller package enable me to easily get the boat out of the way while the car comes into the garage for a series of maintenance and repairs.  Gosh, a car in the garage, what a novel idea! Do not worry, though, fair reader.  Once the oil is changed, the radiator flushed, and heater is working again, boat building will resume.