Shellback Dinghy - Continued

March 7, 2009 It's Starting to look like a Dinghy!!

During my drive to Sturgeon Bay every week I have time to ponder many of life's dilemmas. I think about things like global warming, the economy, carbon dioxide in the air and whether with people like these guys in the species we really will be able to survive.








Anyhow back to the Shellback Dinghy.

Since the building of this boat is part of a museum exhibit certain rules have to be followed. First off, the room where we are working should not sound like an actual ship-yard when there are tiny people with their nose pressed up against the glass. A rule that went into effect just this week is... try not to cause any of your colleagues to bleed. If you accidentally break this rule, try to get them not to bleed on the boat!!

















All that red ain't mahagony!!

All kidding aside it was a regrettable and unfortunately for Dave, a painful incident. He was a very good sport about it and after a few beers later there was no longer any talk of lawyers and other distasteful conversation.















The midplank is the next on and again took much of the day. Careful fitting again insures that the boat will look as it should when all is finished. After the plank is glued and screwed the oozed epoxy must be cleaned off. It's much easier cleaning up while it's wet rather then after it cures!


That's about it for another Saturday! It really is beginning to look like a boat!!

Making a Shellback Dinghy - continued

February 14 and February 21 Getting things set to go!















After the first week we really got going. We did unimaginable things like consulting the blueprints to see what had to be done. We carefully laid out the dimensions for all the parts on the lumber and cut out the pieces. We then threw the various cut-out parts up in the air in the hope that they would land in the correct place and we could glue them together. Turned out that didn't work! So it was back to the drawing board where we built the thing shown right below.



These forms are cut and sanded and laid out very carefully. If this is all done correctly the boat should come together correctly.










First piece on is the deck, aka floor of the boat.





Check and recheck. I know none of you think that the photo on the right is staged. This was spontaneous quality control! It was literally happening all the time by all of us, blah blah blah. The deck is glued and screwed and allowed to sit for a week.

February 28, 2009

Next to come is the first of the laps, the garboard plank. As with the deck it takes several fittings to finally get it right... Most of the morning to be correct and then on the starboard side to do it all over again in the afternoon.


Finally both sides get glued and screwed. The screws are only there to maintain the correct contact piece to piece as the epoxy dries. They will be removed after the glue sets up, about 24 hours, or in this case a week later.


















The end of another day a little time to admire another accomplishment. Museum staff wonders in and decides it's beginning to look like a boat. That's it for February.

Making a Shellback Dinghy

Beginning February 7, 2009

As I was anticipating retirement, (I anticipated retirement for at least the last 10 years of my career at Big Blue!!) I received many suggestions and ideas about what to do during this next phase of my life. These ideas came from many quarters, friends, loved ones, family, colleagues, my doctor, people on the street, enemies, ministers, Rabi's and the odd ayatollah. Suggestions included:

take a cruise
visit the National Parks
camp in the High Sierras
get another degree
take a long road trip
cut your lawn
cut your former colleagues' lawns
build a boat
take a class that teaches you how to build a boat
paint your house
vacuum your house
get cancer
sail around the world
spend a summer on your boat in the North Channel
lock through the St Marys river and summer on Isle Royale
etc
etc
etc

I intend to do all of these things, at least most of them while I'm still walking around loose imposing myself on the world.

The idea of building a boat really caught my attention. Catalogs were sent to me about serious boat building in schools, usually in New England, where you spend months learning every part of the craft. Those schools, probably being really good, seemed to require more commitment, at least money-wise than I was willing to put forth.

Ann discovered a class at a maritime museum in Door County, Wisconsin which was priced right and semi-convenient. I got in! The entrance exam turned out not to be too rigorous!

February 7, 2009, First Day of Boat Building School.

There are 5 of us in the class, all 60-somethings. There is also an instructor who is also old enough to be at least somewhat focused on the benefits of the federal Medicare program. He has actually built boats and seems to know quite a bit about it. The other 4 guys all seem to have some woodworking experience but not in building boats. My own woodworking experience is VERY extensive, having just build a two step ladder some 38 years ago as a freshman in high school. In truth, I do understand which end of the screw-driver turns the screw but had no idea that a block plain could be more useful than a power tool.

All in all it's a pretty good group of guys whose combined enthusiasm and skill seems to be moving things in the proper direction at about the right speed. It amazes me how much we all learned in just the first day.

















There is a book written called "How to Build the Shellback Dinghy" by Eric Dow which most of us purchased and we all read. It's a great reference on how to do this. 180+ steps, none of which seem that easy, but for me one of the most intriguing steps was the makes of (2) 12 by 4 foot 30 mil pieces of mahogany plywood from (3) 4 by 8 foot pieces. To the amazement of most of us we did it almost entirely with small block planes. The process is called scarffing, if you're interested!


Out of the photo above you don't see the rest us patting ourselves on the back as HE WHO WILL INSPECT identifies a job well done. Next the pieces are epoxied together and you have big lumber instead of pretty big lumber!!
















Jigs are used to make both the mid ship frame and the stem. These two pieces are laminated wood and thus the strongest parts of the boat. The wood is Douglas Fir and the glue is epoxy. It's amazing how much you can bend a thin strip of Douglas fir.

Surviving Death Valley

Monday March 4, 2009

For those of you still waiting for me to come home, I did survive Death Valley and a host of other things and here we are in early 2009.

For the record from Death Valley I made my way over the Hoover Dam and down toward Phoenix where a played golf for a couple of days with my brother. Two days later I was back on the rode making my way toward home.

In my travel home I stumbled on the perfect way to get there fast even in the winter. .. A tooth ache!! On my last day of travel I made 1100 miles from Truth or Consequences to Madison. I did not want to get stranded on the highway, in a storm, with an unknown dentist. I got home Saturday morning December 8, 2007 to find out dentists don't work on weekends!!

Here is a picture of what greeted me upon my return!!


What you see is not just a snowbank plowed up by the city but a rock hard wall of ice and snow that would take me most of the following day to clear.

Thus the great road trip.