The phenoseal (the stuff that we glued the canvas down with... ok, really it's Sunbrella, but it acts like canvas) has now dried. This allowed us to cut the openings for the cockpits, and we can now get into the boat again!
One of the tasks last week was to install the toe rails. We'd made these some time before. We also positioned it exactly where we wanted it and drilled for the bronze screws a while back. This meant that we could now install the toe rail in exactly the same place that we'd had it before, providing that we could find the screw holes that we'd made. The problem was that most of these holes were now buried underneath the edge of the canvas...
The holes are quite small, so you can't feel them through the canvas either... The secret to finding them was to find one that was not completely covered by the canvas, and then look at the spacing of the holes on the toe rail. These holes were spaced at 5" intervals, so if you can find one, you've got a good idea as to where its neighbors are. We used a compass opened to 5" to get us close to the next hole
With the point in a known hole, we swing the pencil across the edge of the canvas to get an idea for the next one, and cut a little triangular opening...
Success! It pays to be consistent with your layout.
After opening up all the holes, we brought out the toe rails,
coated the undersides with bedding compound and brought them up to the deck.
These things were thin and noodley, so many hands were needed to safely carry them up to the deck.
Once up on deck, we had to hold them off the deck until they were fastened down.
If we just set them down on the deck, we would have smeared bedding compound all over the place. So, with a few folks holding and a few others fastening
we made relatively short work of it. Both toe rails went on in less than an hour.
Inside the boat, Jeff has been working on getting the rudder tube placement just right.
There's a lot of work there that's not immediately obvious. The short story is that he had to work out the exact angle of the rudder tube, where it would come through the floor that you see with the bronze plate on it, and where to cut the opening in the deck for the rudder post (which nestles in the rudder tube). Much head scratching was involved.
Above the rudder tube you can see the 2 custom bronze fixtures that will hold the shivs for the bridle.
The bridle acts like a traveller, only instead of having the main sheet block be hauled along a track or rod, it's moved by two lines that come up through the deck. It's one of those things that's best seen rather than explained in words. Photos to follow when it's set up.
John has been working on carving out the cove stripe details. Here he is working on the starboard arrow.
The port one was a little farther forward of the dot than we liked
So he filled it and re-carved it.
Now it's a perfect match with starboard.
We came up with a few variations on the feather detail (at the aft end of the cove stripe)
and John used our favorite as his guide for these.
Joel has been fitting the cockpit coamings
and bit by bit she's looking like a boat that's ready to race!
(A Big Thank You to Anna McConnell for helping out with this week's photos)