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.
Mal
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