Thread: The Little Black Dog - MSD Rowing Skiff - Adelaide OZ

I feel for you South Australians at the moment. 25 here in the Hunter Valley, but quite humid. My foils are taking 7 hrs to become touch dry due to the humidity.

I made my GIS mast today, and as I planed the hoop staves the sweat dollops were dropping off everywhere, so I can't imagine what it must be like for you guys.

A cool change came through today so with temperatures in the mid 20s, I came home from work and got stuck right into things.

Seat tops.
Three coats wet on wet on the underside, then glued in place and filletted
In amongst that, I also made dinner and fed my daughter ... well, you've got all that spare time while the poxy is settling eh?

As I said, the temperature is in the mid twenties so I kept with the fast hardener. The coats were an hour to an hour and a half apart and that was plenty. I had to get a wriggle on with the gluing and filletting but I glued and filletted each seat before moving to the next so really had plenty of time - the fast hardener is darned useful stuff ... provided it's cool enough.

I usually judge epoxy useage fairly well but I'm throwing out more goop than went onto the boat dammit . Ah well, at least the seats are on. The heat will be back for the rest of the week so if I hadn't done it tonight, I would have been waiting until saturday. Cor, imagine how hard these fillets will be on saturday - it might be a case of smear some fairing compound over them before trying to sand them.

It's now 11:30 so I'm going to bed ... I'm knackered.

Richard

I lifted the weights off her today ... including the big one hanging off the port rear corner (I've had a 20l jerry can full of water hanging there for the last month to pull her flat).

She looks like a proper boat now ... and yes, I couldn't resist the urge to run the spirit level over her and she seems nicely flattish too A quick feel around through the inspection ports shows lots and lots of epoxy seepage which means she'll be heavier than necessary but also that those seat tops are well glued on.

Next job? Work out how I'm going to get a 5.5m stick of recycled 4x2 home on the roof of my car - the trip's 20km along main roads so just strapping it to the roof rack seems a bit dodgy.

Richard

Originally Posted by Daddles

Next job? Work out how I'm going to get a 5.5m stick of recycled 4x2 home on the roof of my car - the trip's 20km along main roads so just strapping it to the roof rack seems a bit dodgy.

Richard

Well? Good luck.

soth

put a none slip matt on the roof or some old carpet and just make sure you strap it down well and don't brake or corner to hard you should be ok

Originally Posted by honkongphoie

put a none slip matt on the roof or some old carpet and just make sure you strap it down well and don't brake or corner to hard you should be ok

I've got a bit of inch square steel tube a bit over 8 ft long and I was thinking of taping the stick to that then strapping them both on the roof ... and scarfing the broken stick when I get home

Richard
(hope you kill that pneumonia mate )

If a bit of 4x2 can be broken on the roof-bars, it isn't good enough for a boat.
The steel sounds like a useful bit of insurance tho...

Hey Guys,

Couldn't help noticing you were messing about with boats...AND about a year back you were talking about Paulonia spp.
I'm about to mill a coupe of biggish logs and was wondering what sizes you thought appropriate, ie that could be broken down by the average?? boatbuilder like yer good selves without too much drama. Or do you just go to the timberyard and buy 2 sticks of 3 x 1 as you need it?

Also: 1. Was it easy to get?
2. Roughly how expensive was it?
3. Was it the best available timber for the job?

Please comment as it would help my client decide how I cut these logs up.

Best regards,

richie

Most dry timber is about 50mm thick by various widths.

MIK

You there Richard, what's happening?

Signed the Urger

Originally Posted by m2c1Iw

You there Richard, what's happening?

Signed the Urger

Gives us a chance mate, I'm working every day and the weather hasn't really been conducive to getting out there in the evening. Hell, I thought getting those seats coated and on in an evening was a good effort.

Could have worked on her last night, only Adelaide United were playing (sack Vidmar!). Would have been more fun breaking things in the shed. It'd be a good shed job today but I really do have to clean the house before I find I need a broad mouth shovel rather than a vacuum cleaner. I should be able to get out there later in the afternoon ... when I get to clean up the shed. Ruddy house work. It'll be a pleasure being able to move the boat at last though, she's been locked in one place for the last month while I tried to straighten her out and while I built the seats.

Urgers - they're skinny, long legged dogs aren't they? A bit like an oversized, hairy whippet.

Richard

Well that was a wasted morning

Tried to source some gunwale material. You need 19x37 by 5m long (the plans show longer but a measure of the boat says 5 will do it).

So off to my recycling place ... which is over 20km away, in heavy showers (remember the heatwave last week? Now it's bloody thunderstorms. I'm getting as bad as the farmer with weather griping). Also heavy traffic thanks to road works. What did they have? 35x70 ... barely (the fat ones were that thick). Not thick enough to just rip in half and not wide enough to split down the middle ... and the quality didn't look promising anyway (which is an excuse, I didn't pull much out to look).

Dashed back to the car in another heavy shower, and drove back to a specialist timber place, thinking I'll buy good stuff. Nope, they only open during office hours ... while I'm trying to earn money to pay for timber

So I headed back towards home, past home and 10km the other way to a softwood specialist. Nope, they had nothing though they had some half length Radiata sticks for me to sort though in the hope that with enough scarfs and a bad attitude I could make up some gunwales. Nope, not enough I could have bought meranti with that lovely red colour.

Went to a couple of hardware stores and perused their Pinus Crapiata stocks - nothing (what a surprise ).

So I've got to try to get to a specialist store during the week in the hope of forking out huge amounts of money for the ruddy gunwales ... or just sikafex on a length of fat rope.

2 1/2 hours wasted and now I'm late for a neice's 18th birthday.

Tomorrow, I get busy with the sander, I reckon I'm grumpy enough to do a good job of it.

Richard

I'm sooo ashamed

I bought boat building timber from that horrid green store (Bunnings)

Yup. After yesterday's disappointments, I was feeling a tad down, and didn't really want to pay extortionate amounts for clear oregon from a 'real' timber shop, and we had time on our hands, so I wandered into the emporiom, checked out the tool section (and wasn't even remotely tempted - how can you expand a tool section and reduce the range?), then headed off to timber. I'd been there a week or so back and it had been pretty dismal, but they'd restocked. Among this massive stack of 42x19 Pinus Crapiata (the national weed), I picked out 5 clear, sort of straight sticks for only $3 each. They're 3m long so I'll have to scarf but they'll do the job and at a dollar a metre, quite appropriate for this cheapskate's boat.

Rats, there goes another excuse not to work on the boat

Richard

Originally Posted by Daddles

They're 3m long so I'll have to scarf but they'll do the job and at a dollar a metre, quite appropriate for this cheapskate's boat.

Rats, there goes another excuse not to work on the boat

Richard

Hehe, and now you know where to get more.....humphhh......