Boat shed advances in fits and starts

My boat shed is coming on. The slab was cast today so I can finally see the layout. Looks enormous like this. Daisy G will sit on the long leg of the L whilst the right had leg will be a workshop. It will be timber from here on up, so shouldn't take too long to build. The builder reckons about a month. Getting the boat in will be fiddly as the lane is too narrow to just back straight in. I will have to unhitch the trailer, swing it around and hope I have enough oomph to push it back in.

Thinking of workshops, I have been carrying out some very rough and ready tests on the strength of epoxy/ply filleted joints. I was interested to see if the fibreglass tape is really necessary on the inside. Results were interesting and I have been posting them on the Wooden Boat forum:
http://forum.woodenboat.com/showthread.php?119666-Beginer-s-Epoxy-plywood-query

Last sail of the season 8nm (417nm total)

Down just for the day to get Daisy G. ready for haul out. It was a beautiful date, but an edge to the temperature and the sun sets at 7:15. I noticed when I got on board that my jib sheet had been wrapped around my mizzen, which is not how I left it. Further inspection showed that the ties around the mizzen sail had slipped off and the sail must have been flogging. Someone had come on board and wrapped the sheet around it to stop it ripping itself apart. The mizzen sprit was a bit bashed and the ensign has disappeared but apart from that no damage. Nice to know someone is keeping an eye out and did something about it.

There was the gentlest of wind, so I decided to sail off the mooring for the fun of it. By all my calculations, I should have drifted slowly backward with just main and mizzen loose. But as soon as I cast off the mooring, she started to drive slowly forward. I just missed the neighbouring boat. I'll never get the hang of this sailing business.

I sailed very slowly across the harbour and round Furzey and Green Islands. Only one tack needed and then round to Brownsea Island, where I anchored and went ashore for a walk. I was aground when I got back, so I pumped out the ballast tank and was able to push her off. I motored straight back to the marina and tied up to the pontoon. Unloaded an embarassingly large amount of stuff, took off the sails and then lowered the masts. The carbon fibre is worth it, lowering the main mast is a completely undramatic affair.


As I was stowing everything two little girls came running down the pontoon from a boat that had just tied up behind me.

"Guess what my sister's name is!"
"Ooh, I don't know, is it Mary?"
"No, it's Daisy Grace!"

I congratulated her on an excellent name. My Dasiy Grace is back on her mooring, looking a bit folorn with her masts down. I shall haul her out at the begining of next month.

Peanut sails

I have made up a sail for the Peanut model which is is as near as I can judge the size and proportion of the mizzen sail and mast from the BayCruiser. It looks much more possible than I imagined. It is tall, so the healing effect of the mast will be significant, but it is carbon fibre so the weight will not be great. The sail area doesn't look too bad and the short length of the boom is positively beneficial. I would envisage just a single rope from the boom as a sheet. Maybe a couple of thumb cleats to hook it round on the quarters, but probably just held in the hand.

I have also found that I can get some Asian marine ply locally for about £25 a sheet. Not the best I suspect, but good enough I should think. It is meant to be a two sheet boat, but that doesn't include the fore deck, rudder and lee board, so I shall need three sheets. That should mean that potentially £100 would cover ply and epoxy.

Progress, of sorts, on Peanut

I am still toying with the idea of building a Peanut Pram. I have gone as far as buying a bag of cable ties to hold it all together. I have also done what they always says you should do, and built a small card model. Surprisingly easy. I just printed out the basic plan to fit an A4 page. Then pricked through the plans onto thin card to mark the points, joined the dots, sliced out the parts and sellotaped them together. It really does show you how the panels have to twist to form the shape. It is surprisingly elegant and very satisfying to do. The only change I have made is to put in a longitudinal seat. I have got long legs and I really need a lot of leg room. This would give a chance of getting it right. You can't row with bent knees.

Getting near the end of the season 14nm (409nm total)

Down to Poole for a night and a day. Bright weather but the sun never blazes and the nights are coming rapidly earlier. I drove down after work and motored out to Brownsea Island to anchor out for a flat calm night. Only disturbance was the bangs of fireworks over Poole, but I couldn't see them. In the morning I fitted some small electrical conduit which I bought at Maplins to tidy up the various cables from batteries and solar panels to the radio and GPS. It was very succesful. Looks good and stops me tripping over the wires. I had to buy three times as much conduit as I needed, but I might redo the whole thing over the winter now I have got the idea.

The only other change to the boat was to the mizzen. I have rigged a conventional snotter rope (interesting term) to tension the sprit boom. It work well and it stays tight, which the original outhaul never did. The only problem is that the main sheet can snag the heel of the sprit, but I think a bit of fine tuning will help relieve that. I am also planning to move the point where the main sheet fixes to the boom further forward, which is how I think it is done on the later boats. I took out the dinghy and various bits and pieces and took them home in preparation for hauling out later in the month.

The shed progresses and is quite dominant at the head of the back garden. But hidden from view in all directions.

Peanut Pram

I've received the plans and manual for the Peanut Pram and I think even I could build this one. It seems to omit many of the parts of other boats I've looked at. It will be interesting to see if those parts are really needed.

The plans came as a PDF file within a few minutes of placing the order. They can be printed out full size, but as all the measurements are pretty clear (in inches) it should be easy enought to plot them out from small prints. The manual seems detailed enough to tell me what to do.

The costs are still significant. Two sheets of 6mm marine ply is well over £100 and epoxy resin and glass fibre tape will add quite a chunk to that. The trick will be to buy all the parts seperately over a period of time and never to add it all up.  Plans are from

http://www.common-sense-boats.com/

My cunning plan is to use the mizzen from Daisy G as the mast and sail for this. The sail areas are about the same, but the mast will be about twice the height. That couldn't possibly cause a problem, could it?