I didn't take a photo earlier but this is what the electrical system fit out looks like now. Below is from the forward side of the cabin looking aft.
And a close up. Battery selector top right with isolation switch below it. And the board to select circuits. Still have to paint the floor after the engine install.
Other progress is we took a few deep breaths and decided to roll it out of the shed. First off was to double strap down onto the cradle to reduce rocking.
Then it was time to jack up and put rollers under the cradle.
Yep, still surprises me we can roll this thing out on 10mm steel rods.....
Then we were ready to winch, strap onto the cradle and cable run out.
Below we are underway, about half way to the cradle being off the slab.
And a shot from inside:
Plenty of clearance on the 3 metre wide opening of the shed. There was a little bit more on the other side, about 4 fingers width!
Almost there, about to drop the rear of the cradle off the concrete slab onto hardwood blocks. We had to keep jacking it up to put new rollers in under the front as they went out the back of the cradle.
And success! Light fading as I enjoyed a Corona and admired the lines from various angles.
Since then I have attached the bowsprit, still waiting on a through bolt in stainless through the top of the stem fitting. It is bolted into a socket in the anchor well, with another piece of hardwood wedged underneath it with two bolts through it to prevent the bowsprit moving up or down. The orange bit is a piece of plastic so no-one drives under it in a truck and snaps it off!
Below is a shot down the bowsprit showing the support for the stainless steel anchor roller, along with hardwood for the chain to run down. I have a 16kg anchor to go in.
And a shot showing the socket middle top of photo where the bowsprit is attached and bolted. The chain run is hardwood lined with cut up cheap kitchen cutting boards. Once they wear I can easily unscrew them and replace for less than $10.
Next on the list is completing the mounting box and running lines for the radio and chart plotter/depth sounder inside the rear of the main cabin, and completing the painting in there.
Then:
- rigging
- sails
- engine connection
- transport and launch
I still had a few things to finish while the boat was on a secure concrete footing to allow for winching it out of the shed.
First off was the boat cradle. Many moons ago we had to cut the building cradle cross pieces to slide in the lead keel. Since that time I have had long pieces of wood screwed and clamped together to hold the two halves in place.
Below is November 13 (wow, time flies) showing the building cradle:
And April 15 with the keel in place, the wood to the left once went all the way through forward and aft.
To reattach the two we had to again get the jacks and blocking out, and raise the entire boat front and rear until we could slide in pieces to cover the gaps across. We used the same dimension structural timber, longer than the gap with extra wood each side of the cut to continue underneath the upright supports. These were then bolted through with two or three 10mm galvanised bolts each side, with extra hardwood bolted on the other side in the gap to strengthen against flex. We also had to remove the upright supports against the chine of the hull as these were outside the width and wouldn't fit through the shed door.
We then jacked the whole thing up higher again, and put hardwood pieces 75mm square (the last of the kwila keel timbers cut in half) parallel to the keel and just outside. I have another piece to put directly under the keel, but it is not in place yet which will be covered shortly.
This is a shot from front on, showing how I had to limit the width to get out the door. The two hardwood slides are under the inner most upright support each side, the final one will be directly under the keel. I have added straps from the chainplates to the support to reduce movement side to side but seems as secure as it has always been.
With the extra height I could then epoxy over the final rear keel bolts with sanding filling powder mixed in. Previously these were too close to the floor to get at, and once set they were sanded to match the keel.
The final prep is to paint the underside of the lead and the rear hardwood sections of the keel which I could not get to. So far I have done two coats with International Interprotect epoxy sealer/primer but need to get some more. Below is looking aft from the rear of the lead keel towards the rudder:
For sometime I have been getting asked what the boat name will be. A bloke I know who is doing up a runabout let me know that the Queensland Department of Transport now allows you to pick your boat registration number, and you can reserve one free of charge for six months before launch. A quick check revealed the boat rego I wanted was free. Down I went to sit around for 45minutes waiting and it was mine! The boat will be Welsford Sundowner sail number 18, so the boat registration number will be SUN18Q.
Now the name.
During construction on a number of occasions one term kept cropping up. Be it when I told people I was going to build a boat in the shed, the size of the keel we melted, the thickness of the rudder pintles or just in general conversation.
'Overkill'. eg "how big is it going to be? That's a bit of overkill don't you think". Dictionary.com had a definition that also struck a chord as well.
overkill [oh-ver-kil]
noun - the capacity of a nation to destroy, by nuclear weapons, more of an enemy than would be necessary for a military victory. - an instance of such destruction. - an excess of what is required or suitable, as because of zeal or misjudgment.
Sounded like me. It is also the title of one of my favourite 'Men at Work' songs.
So that was the name sorted.
I started looking at boat names and rego stickers. After looking around I bought some from Boat Names Australia (www.boatnames.com.au) and they were sent out in the post. A couple of viewings of the youtube videos on how to stick them on and away I went. I have no connection to them, but they were a good price, had an online design tool you could use to check fonts, were prompt and looked like I could apply them.
Process was easy: clean the hull with metho, position the name, peel off half the backing, spray soapy water on and attach using a provided tool to press on, do the other half and leave it. Come back in half an hour and wet down with water, leave for 30 seconds then carefully peel of the front cover. Below shows the registration number and home port ready to be fixed on the port side of the transom:
And the name on the starboard side:
The transom is too close to the back of the shed to line up the camera so the photo is not level, but I used one to line up the names etc so they should be.
After looking across the transom:
And again the photo looking straight at the transom is not level, but you get the idea:
I will continue to paint the underside of the keel, then it is time to drag the boat out of the shed to mount the mast tabernacle (would make it too high to get out of the shed if done inside) and organise the engine mounting and truck.
House renovations continue to compete with the important part of life in the shed, along with totally destroying the boat fund but I continue on.
Last instalment I was working on the chain plates and positioning them. I had just finished cutting them out. Below shows the kwila external ones notched for the chain plates and the internal ones which are two layers of 12mm hardwood glued together. On the left bottom you can see the 6mm stainless steel backing plate for the inside.
Once they were all shaped I marked them with a chisel and painted them all with sealer undercoat and then a couple of coats of exterior paint. Below is the grey sealer undercoat (two coats).
These are the tools I used to drill the holes for the chain plates (mostly successfully). I started with a smaller drill using squares and level to attempt to get them straight. I drilled the top forward and very bottom holes of a chain plate first, as deep as the drill bit would go followed by a smaller hole with the brace and bit. Once I cut through inside I could drill (it was only a small distance at the top and bottom where it hit inside stingers) and position temporary threaded rod.
Once the top and bottom threaded rod were in I could position the external chain plate and the internal backing plate. Then the procedure was the same, with the small electric drill bit and brace and bit hole allowing me to see where I was going. If I was off, it was easier to adjust my drill angle from outside when I went to the final hole size to hit the backing plate.
Below shows the port side middle chain plate, which is the galley inside, with temporary threaded rod.
And from the inside. The top bolt (forward side), goes through the gunwale stringer and the bottom bolt through a lower stringer, the others just the hull. The hardwood backing plate goes against the ply hull and packs out the gap so it can be bolted in place. The aft top hole on the middle chain plate each side got a stainless coach screw. All others are total through bolts.
Below shows the holes you end up with in the hardwood backing plate and the hull/rubbing strakes.
Once I had drilled all the holes I measured and ordered all the bolts in stainless steel, bought some more tubes of sika marine sealant and called on my father. Together we liberally spread sika between the hull and the backing plates and into each hole, and bolted down the plates. I chose not to sika the inside, if I see water that means I need to give them attention rather than have water between the outside and inside sitting.
Below shows the final view of the port side chain plates.
I have also finished painting the engine box which is below. At the front is a slide in cover which may have an air vent (to be determined) and a slide on top which will form my table and also the step to get up into the cockpit from the cabin. The entire thing attaches to the engine bay with a few screws and can be totally slid off into the cabin space towards the galley for all round engine access for servicing.
Another exciting task was cutting the foam for the berth cushions/seats. Below shows the complex angles with the curve of the hull to the left, the top surface fitting around a frame and then joining another. This was before I painted the ply seat tops, from memory the foam is 150mm thick.
Below shows the port side forward one closest to the galley. The fridge wiring runs to here as well, so I may make another smaller one which can be swapped in.
Below is a view looking forward in the forward cabin.
And a shot looking aft. The main mattress is split to match the swing up supports underneath.
Below are all the finished cut foam pieces before I sent them off to the seamstress (my mother) for covering. She has threatened me with bodily injury if I ever ask her to do anything similar again. The angles, cut outs and curves were a nightmare.
A bloke I work with who helped me connect up the 12v wiring also does a bit of 3D printing so made up a mount for two gauges for the house battery/current draw and cranking battery. I had to cut the top name plate part off to fit it where I wanted, but mounting is underway to allow me to monitor the power.
My final project has been an anchor mount. I have purchased a mount and a 16kg anchor, but figuring out where to put the mounts with all the bowsprit rigging was a challenge. I didn't want to drill holes in the bowsprit, so have used some of the kwila (100mm x 100mm) from the renovations and also some off cut hardwood to make supports front and rear that clamp onto the bowsprit with 10mm gal bolts (solid pieces right and middle in the photo below). These support the fitting at the left of the photo which is an angled piece of 20mm hardwood (with 20mm doubler underneath) which has 19mm hardwood sides to keep the chain/anchor contained. The fitting is angled down slightly, which was a challenge when the bowsprit angles up 12 degrees. I have now painted it and lined the anchor support with sections of polyurethane cutting board but the photos had too much sun on them to be useful. I will take some more.
That about gets you up to date. Plan now is to finish mounting the battery gauges, keep working on a plotter placement bracket and drag the boat out of the shed pending engine connection.
Quotes for sails have been obtained, still chasing riggers.
Starting on a sad note, Mr Charlie Wipple the original client that resulted in the plans for the Sundowner being drawn has passed away. If you click on the link on the page to the top right you can see his build. He was kind enough to email compliments to me once on my progress, which was kind
I am juggling work on the house with the build, but it still continues slowly towards a this year launch hopefully.
Since the last update (how quick time flies) I have finished the engine surround box and the door for the storage above it/under the exit into the cockpit. I also painted the main cabin seats/berth and around the edge of the cabin floor which I think I will Kiwigrip. None of which is overly interesting in photo so I will save them for when the engine installation is done soon.
With photos I have purchased and mounted a transom ladder, shown below folded up:
And in the down position:
I have purchased two winches, but looks like I will have to mount them on a steel plate and then screw it into the coamings to get the correct alignment angle for the sheets and also be able to securely fix it down.
I have spent a while working on chainplates. I corresponded with John Welsford, and marked out the locations with string, plumb bob and crossed fingers.
Once I marked the locations I had to notch in the chainplates slightly. I put an extra thickness on the rubbing strake where the chainplates go, with the intention getting them in slightly to prevent them catching on anything. Below shows the aft most one, with the notches filled with epoxy to seal.
This is after it was sanded back and cleaned up on the stb side. The top hole and bottom one are to position it down the track, you will see.
Once I had six notches, I then had to shape a backing plate in the space between the chainplate and the hull which was around 25mm. Below is sitting in place, there will be a 12mm spacer between the top two holes and the gunwale.
I was looking around the shed for some hardwood, and found some kwila hardwood from a door we had removed in the house. Perfect. Holding up a level and a bevel gauge I ended up with angles all over the place but cut it to fit against the hull.
Then I ran a pencil along the hull and using an angle grinder with wood disk shaped it to fit against the hull curve.
This is against the hull showing the curve in place, which will have sika between them:
Now of course the wood was too far out, so I marked it for the chainplates, took some measurements for depth and sawed/chiseled and angle grinder/orbital sanded it down.
And with the chainplate in place:
Making six of those kept me out of trouble for a while, here is the port side with the most aft chainplate sitting there. The chainplates and blocking are vertical, the sides of the chainplate get wider as you go up which makes the forward one look off as the hull curves up.
Next is the inside with backing plates, then sand and finish paint. After that buy stainless bolts and mount them I guess. Getting closer slowly.
