Thread: Building a Waller TS540

Originally Posted by rob540

And Richard, how are you managing with unemployed tools and no boat to build?

It's hard to adjust but i have been keeping myself occupied with a few jobs that desperately need do on the house and car for the moment (but the wood working tools are still unemployed)

This may soon change some of the commercial fisherman where i have moored my boat have asked if i can build them some dinghy's
plus where my girlfriend works she showed them some pics of my Yellowtail, and one of them has asked if i can build a boat for one of their friends, i'll need to find out more details, so i best not get to excited yet
and to be honest in my mind i would like a restoration project to do.
Up untill the second world war Guernsey relyed a lot on fishing, and there are still a few of the old tradional clinker boats still around (most 14' to 18' in length) we have a small boat yard that is owned by an old man nearly as old as some of the boats and he seems to find these type of boats on a regular basis, but i'm to scared to venture near as i'm bound to come away with some thing

I think I'll go with the advice from Madaz and Mike. Mike is probably right about the kite. The standard rig area is slightly greater than a Hartley TS18,and this is a smaller, lighter boat, but hey, what do I know?
Maybe I can use them to power my dental floss.

Richard- I'd go and see the old man. The restoration project might be waiting in his yard, and if you're not ready yet he might hold it for you. Restoring is a great way to learn other people's methods and old traditions, but I guess we're all worried about ending up with a yard full of 'some day' jobs!

The foredeck and side decks are glued down and the second layer of 4mm ply has been glued to the cabin roof.
Apart from the hatch, that means that there is no more sheeting to be done! In darker moments I sometimes wondered if there was just some endless insatiable need for plywood, it even occurred to me that in order to go for a sail, I might have to feed it a couple of sheets, to subdue the beast before it would let me step the mast.



Now I know that this photo looks horribly like one of the previous ones, but humour me. It has lots more plywood glued on it and I have started to fair some of the quite subtle curves that run in the vertical and horizontal planes from front to back. When they are sweet and happily reconciled the rounding of corners can begin.


The edges of the decks have to be carefully faired into the sheer edge in preparation for the rubbing or sheerstrakes- which will be from 18mm sq. hardwood.
Inside, I'm still trying to work out which other bits to paint, while meantime the centreboard is being painted, the hatchway sliding logs await me (nagging on the bench) like impatient children, the sails are wriggling around in their bag and need regular discipline, the sheerstrakes have been scarphed and are waiting to cure, the mast and boom blanks mock me from the side of the shed every time they see me because they have not a shred of fittings on them, and the boat trailer is in bits trying to trip me every time I walk past, and the roll of glass leers at me from the corner.

Originally Posted by rob540

while meantime the centreboard is being painted, the hatchway sliding logs await me (nagging on the bench) like impatient children, the sails are wriggling around in their bag and need regular discipline, the sheerstrakes have been scarphed and are waiting to cure, the mast and boom blanks mock me from the side of the shed every time they see me because they have not a shred of fittings on them, and the boat trailer is in bits trying to trip me every time I walk past, and the roll of glass leers at me from the corner.

besides all that Rob she looks great it's a great feeling when you know you've cut your last sheet of ply or scarfed your last bit of timber, the end is in sight

is that more saw dust i see in the cabin ?

Originally Posted by honkongphoie

besides all that Rob she looks great it's a great feeling when you know you've cut your last sheet of ply or scarfed your last bit of timber, the end is in sight

is that more saw dust i see in the cabin ?

Well it looks to me both of you will be looking for new projects soon

Soon? Mmmm. Is that metric or imperial soon? Are we talking imminent, or in the not too distant future? Generous thought Mike.
I've left the rig and trailer for the moment because suddenly it gets cold in our hills and the 'poxy gets fussier, so I'm concentrating on temperature dependent things first. The mast is a whole new can of worms for me. It's made of this weird stuff called metal and I don't like it much. There is a whole bag of swivelly/plasticy/metally bits with holes and castings at the Chandlers that have to be fitted. To what? I don't begin to know. Where does the steering wheel go? Where is the brake pedal? Did I mention the small matter of epoxying/glassing the deck and cabin exterior? Oh, and the p-p-pppaint.

But I'm not really in a hurry, I'm determined to enjoy each little step because doing new stuff sends me to sleep really well. (Ref. Richard's first post in the Devlin thread!)

But I had a wonderful dream the other night. Steady wind, round in a fast tack, toes curled, wet, warm under a strap, assertive pull on the sheet and the sail firms up like molded plastic, my head swings back as my backside lifts and vertical isn't where it used to be, and shoot off through the tops of razor waves. Dead straight.
Haven't actually done that for years.

Rob I found this clip which I think is quite appropriate for any boatbuilder


[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKo8Blydd9w"]YouTube - Hold on Tight to your Dream! by ELO[/ame]

Originally Posted by honkongphoie

besides all that Rob she looks great it's a great feeling when you know you've cut your last sheet of ply or scarfed your last bit of timber, the end is in sight

is that more saw dust i see in the cabin ?

No. Noo,no,no no, well, yes, but it could be grated chocolate, or cocoa, or instant coffee or...
I suppose all your tools are now polished, all scraps have hit the wood heater, and the workspace is clean enough to eat off all the floors? Every now and then my helpful wife takes pity on me and makes it all seem nice, but if I'm in a hurry it doesn't last long. With very few available hours per week I often just don't feel that clean up is worth my time- except for safety reasons. If I have a 2 hour session available to me I work out an achievable goal, then go like the clappers till time is up, then I'm cleaning myself up while I go to the next thing.
Actually it's more complicated than that. While away from the project, I'll find an achievable goal, and assemble what is needed for it, then in each session, I'll try to work on that goal, but also do something to a job already started and do some thinking or planning for a job that is in front of me as well, so that when I get to it some of the preliminaries are already done. Progress, consolidate and plan!

And thanks for the video Mike, but of course I'm not old enough to know who ELO is...

Originally Posted by rob540

No. Noo,no,no no, well, yes, but it could be grated chocolate, or cocoa, or instant coffee or...

i'll let you off then

Originally Posted by rob540

I suppose all your tools are now polished, all scraps have hit the wood heater, and the workspace is clean enough to eat off all the floors?

well i have to be honest here since the boat came out of my temporary work shop i have only been back a few times to get the odd tool i need to do some work on the house. so it still has everything just lying on the bench (ready for the next one) i don't really like going there with the thought of clearing up
all the scraps and off cuts are still standing in the corner (just waiting to be used) a half used can of epoxy just byding it's time and the tools just begging to be used in anger on 15 sheets of marine ply

first chance i've had to have a proper look at yours Rob. Very nice, I like the rounded cockpit seat edges. I would have done that to mine if I had it over.
in response to your winch question, I am going to run a pully on the jib and so get 2 to 1 purchase to assist. I think winches are a bit heavy and cost alot so if you can do with out them its best to.
Again well done
Scotty

Good to hear from you Scotty.
It's interesting how Mike W altared the interior layout for the 540, you'd have more cabin space with the berths tucked up under the cockpit seats, but I'll have more cockpit locker space and the possibility of playing footsies when sleeping in the cabin. I think the berth under cockpit seat thing is possibly why Mike didn't offer the rounded seat edge as an option (as far as I know) in the 5.4- because of the change of angle from a taper to lines parallel to the centre-line in that design.
Yours is a corker and will be very fine, and lighter I think. Your fillets are worthy of framing ( or should that be frying?).
I'm very interested in your views on the controls. How will you set up the pulleys? That is, where will you locate and anchor them? What about the spinnaker issue? I've always thought that if the finances permit it would be a gennaker on a bow pole that I would choose.

Rob

The last few weeks haven't provided many opportunities to clock up boat hours, and sometimes you just need to turn up and do the things that don't make good photos and don't make you feel that much has changed.

The rubbing strakes are on and are pretty much shaped. Fitting them was an interesting process, but not a difficult one. As the flare changes along the sheerline, the angle of the rubbing strake changes, and it threw up an inside edge, particularly aft. This was quite handy and I found it was easy to raise the two ends of the strakes- only by about 1.5mm, so that when the top edge is leveled down to the deck line, they had become ever-so-slightly tapered in a way that made the bottom of the strake more curvy than the top. This isn't really visible, even when you know its there, but the strake just looks less 'chunky' than it did when dry fitted because the ends are slightly finer. Toe rails will go on when the deck epoxying and sanding is done.

The cabin roof and decks are now glassed, but without a clear stretch of time available, I've had to let the epoxy cure without a wet on wet second layer. That means sanding before re-coating. The hatch beam logs have been 'poxied and are ready for some hatchway trim pieces, and the hatch itself- but this is still only a twinkle in my eye.

The toe rails were a pleasure to fit, and they do add a certain feeling of detail to the appearance of the edge, and all went in easily....But while rounding the edges, the router caught a small bit of grain on one of the bendy bits, and caused a 20mm long superficial edge split. It's no big deal and is easily fixed with a bit of 'poxy, but there is a lesson in there. I really enjoy looking at timber, and am normally fairly aware of grain orientation in selecting and fitting it, and I admit that most of the time my concern is verging on overkill.
This time, nice straight, long grained hardwood was selected, and although I noted a few spots where the grain ran out to the edge, the 18mm square strip only had to be oriented in a certain way to keep that from being a problem. All it took for the stuff-up to occur was a 90 degree rotation of the stick between boat and chop-saw, while matching it's length to the opposite piece, and then in my haste and overconfidence, NOT NOTICING IT. Like I said, it is no big deal, the repair is simple and will take less than 2 minutes, but it needn't have happened at all if I had just kept my mind tuned in.



The shot above is after glassing. The mast step block has just been positioned and is looking a bit grotty- tried to work a sort of fillet around it while the poxy under it was still reluctant to go off in the cold air, and a few bits decided to look ugly for the camera. The hatch rails are just sitting up there while I work out how to do all that (!) and I have decided to enjoy the process of inventing the hatch design as I go along. This is one area of the boat where the designer has left the design to the builder's discretion (as if I ever had any of that!). The reason for that is possibly that he's made the hatch opening nice and wide and deep to make the step over the bridge deck easier, and it certainly works for me, and I do like having that bridge deck for several reasons.- but a consequence is that the roof is not quite long enough for the full hatch length, also because our hinged mast step is longer than a more standard one. I'm going to make a top washboard with a hat that slides down over the aft end of the hatch to seal it, thus making up the length 'shortfall'.



This shows the start of my attempt to build a lightweight sliding hatch, using a ply rectangle to keep things flat and square while the fairly thin frame is assembled. I'll put the skin on while it is still supported, then I can worry about the sliding bits later!

Rob why does the hatch look super wide on the bench.....I mean a lot wider than the hatch opening? Not trying to be a smarta$$ or anything it may just be distortion I keep looking at it in comparison for size with the bench.

Good idea using the ply to keep everything square....you got to love a simple solution.