Accommodation takes shape… and thinking ahead to summer.

I can’t believe that 3 months have already passed since my last post, and that spring has most definitely sprung. As I write, I am sitting at the desk in my cabin on SD Warden in shorts and T-shirt at the end of another beautiful sunny working day on the west coast. Well, it was foggy yesterday, as the haar crept round the top of Scotland for a west coast holiday, but who can blame it?

Anyway, I have finally sat down to write another update on progress, covering the work I have done over my last leave period and the weekends since, so here goes…

I left you having an almost-finished heads compartment and a forecabin which was well on its way to being fitted out. Both these compartments are now almost finished, with some minor trim, small bits of plumbing (in the heads) and varnishing still to do, but I thought with the major work completed I would move aft and start on the saloon, otherwise I could have been stuck up in the forepeak for ever. When I say compartments are almost complete, I have not yet started with headlinings, for the good reason that there are many fittings still to be drilled for and through-bolted in the main deck / deckhead, so these linings are likely to be among the last bits of fitting out in the majority of spaces at least. I have of course done the headlining in the forepeak (i.e. under the foredeck), which I had started during the last post, and will probably also be able to do the one in the aft peak under the cockpit seats as well, after running a few more cables for any electrics / electronics at the aft end of the cockpit. This area is best lined out sooner rather than later, as I intend to run a ventilation trunking (similar to the short one in the forepeak from the foredeck vent into the very pointy end and thence into cable lockers, but longer) from the aft stbd mooring post vent to the back end of the engine compartment, as I want to provide better ventilation to the engine. This is a problem for future Me, however, so now back to what I have done over the last several weeks.

I think I left you having fitted the bunk board and framework for the under-bunk lockers in the forecabin. The next job I undertook was making doors – three for the lockers and the big sliding door for the heads compartment. Since making the locker doors for the two lockers in the heads, I have honed my procedure somewhat, by acquiring a set of router bits which mill the edges of the rails and stiles of doors, so that the parts join together neatly and consistently, incorporating 6mm door panels (the heads lockers have rather more substantial 12mm panels!). The locker door parts were milled up from my stock of 20mm red hardwood boards, but the heads door needed a slightly beefier construction, with 25mm teak from my stock of reclaimed lab worktops. Again my saw rail came into its own when ensuring that the edges were cut true and straight, and finished nicely, before ensuring the butt ends of each rail were cut precisely square and then the edges all milled with the relevant bit to make it all fit together. Once the panels were cut (also exactly square of course), the doors could be dry-fitted together to make sure it all worked, before committing to glue. The trick for glueing up is ensuring that the surface you are doing it on is dead flat, so you don’t end up with a warped door – this would have been particularly irritating with the heads door (as it would also have been if it was at all out-of-square), as for it to function as a sliding door, there is little tolerance for wonkiness. Once glued up, the usual tidy up of the joints was required, and the ends of the stiles planed (trimmed with a router) flush with the rails. A good sanding followed, then the panels were painted up to and including a first top coat (which is where I have left all the white panelling in the forecabin so far).

The next job was to devise and assemble the channels in which the sliding door would fit and slide on the bulkhead. This involved first getting the door into the position it would sit in when closed, then drawing lines top and bottom to mark where the top and bottom jambs (? – my terminology when it comes to hand-built timber sliding door parts is perhaps not as comprehensive as it should be) would be. Finding some suitable timber, I then milled this to dimensions to allow for the thickness of the door plus the teflon strips which allow the door to slide smoothly (like a slippery, slidey thing). I ripped a teflon sheet into inch-wide strips (this I had left over from doing exactly the same job in Meander, about 15 years ago), and had exactly sufficient for double strips top and bottom (i.e. on the top and bottom edges of the door, and on the mating faces of the jambs), and single strips either side of the door, ultimately making a slippery “U” channel top and bottom. I fitted these in their respective positions and then made up a vertical jamb for the door to close against (and eventually latch to, when I can find a decent latch which will not cost a fortune), before screwing in place a valance top and bottom to form the third side of each of the channels (hopefully the photos will help you follow my description of how this all went together. I have removed the soundtrack to the video I made of the finished door being slid with a pokey stick in one hand whilst standing back to film the action with my phone in the other! I was obviously not born for off-the-cuff narration).

This, like many of the finishing joinery jobs, was quite involved and fiddly, and took a while to get right, so I was glad to get this finished and to move on to hanging the locker doors (including the heads lockers). First I had to fit jambs to the hardwood frames under the forward bunk – requiring accurate mitring of a 25mm strip of hardwood, and tacking these in place from behind. I also had to rout the recesses for the hinges in the frames and the edges of the doors , for which I created a jig for the small router. Unfortunately I made this slightly oversized, so the recesses are bigger than they need to be, but this allows a fudge factor and doesn’t look bad when the hinges are in place, so I will continue to use this jig rather than going for a harder-to-achieve and easier-to-f*&k-up precision fit. After screwing the hinges to the doors, I then had the very satisfying job of hanging the 5 doors, and managed to get them opening and closing without needing to plane too much off any of the edges – and importantly, they all look reasonably lined up!

Other jobs I needed to complete up forward before moving on were:

• Painting both sides and fitting the deckhead panels in the forepeak (between bulkheads 1 and 2)
• Fitting the vent trunking from the foredeck vent through bulkhead 1 – first I had to cover the trunk in white Fablon, as they only come in grey, despite the junctions, bends etc. coming in white.
• Build a couple of shelves atop a couple of stowage bins on the port side of the forepeak.
• Fitting the nice brass grill to the vent cut in bulkhead 2 into the cable lockers.
• Fitting slats to the bunk – these were made from the softwood planking that had previously been making up the temporary sole boards I had in the main cabin for so long, before I fitted the sole beams.
• Running power cabling for the nav lights which will be fitted to the sides of the dorade boxes for the port (heads) and stbd (cabin) vents

Still to complete in the forecabin:

• Some little bits of trim to finish the exposed edges of bulkhead 2.
• Fiddles for cave lockers under foot of bunk.
• Bits of trim to cover up any mistakes and poorly cut bits elsewhere.
• Varnish – lots of it.
• Final coat of white paint throughout.
• Fit heads and complete its plumbing (after final coat of white paint applied to bulkhead behind).
• Complete black water tank vent plumbing and cut hole for vent fitting (adjacent and inboard of port dorade vent).
• Cut vent holes in deck and fit mushroom vents and subsequently dorade boxes.
• Wire in the nav lights.
• Cut hole for black water tank pump-out port.
• Lay cork flooring in cabin portion of the space between Bhd 2 and 3 and trim edges of sole boards with teak strip (ex-deck planks from a Norwegian boat which was in the shed for about a year!)
• Porthole linings.
• Head linings.
• Catches / knobs for lockers (type yet to be determined).
• Catch for heads door.

After completing the first list, I felt able to move aft and start work in the saloon. I started on the starboard side, which has a straight, and therefore relatively simple (!) settee. The first job in here was the hull lining. As elsewhere in the boat I have two types of lining timber: the T&G Scottish larch for the visible bits, and the plain square-edged softwood ceiling planks for lockers etc and where I want a bit more ventilation. In the case of the saloon, I chose to use the T&G boards as far down as the settee seats, so the lockers behind the seat backs have a contiguous lining. Once the planks have received sufficient coats of quick drying polyurethane floor varnish, it is a relatively quick job to cut these to length and fit them, although this part of the hull widens out quite a lot in the two-metre length of the settee, so a bit of sweating and edge-bending of the T&G planks was required, to ensure no gaps between them, and some tapered and stealer planks in the locker ceiling to allow for the widening hull. Most of these will be hidden under the water tank which takes up 2/3 of the underseat space.

Once the linings were in place, I then had to devise and fit a framework for the settee itself, but this would also be holding the full water tank in place, so would need to be pretty substantial and solid. I cut all of this (except the end supports which are screwed onto the bulkheads) from 2×2 softwood, and again the fiddly part was cutting all the half-lap joints to fit all of this together. I also had to build up a couple of substantial “beds” on the locker lining planks, and more or less coincident with the hull frames, to take the bulk of the weight of the water tank. Again this was fiddly, and required fine tuning of wedge-shaped pieces of wood, tapered both lengthways and across, to ensure a good fit and proper support. All of this was then dismantled again for painting before final fitting around the water tank. I have yet to plumb in the tank, but will soon cut the holes for both tanks’ filler ports whilst I’m on a run of cutting holes in the deck during the warmer “epoxy” months!

As the furniture gradually comes into being, and my plans for electrics and electronics develop, I am bit-by-bit running more cabling through the boat. I already mentioned the nav light power cables, which I have run for all the nav lights – the sidelights will be on the forward dorade boxes as I said, the stern light will be clamped to the pushpit, and there will be a combined steaming light and deck flood near the mainmast head, the three-core cable for which I have run as far as the main mast step. As with my previous boats, I will use a paraffin anchor light so there will not be an electric one fitted.

I have also run supplies and antenna cables for the nav systems and comms. I have run military-spec coaxial cable for the VHF and AIS antennae: the former will be at the mainmast head, and the latter at the foremast head, and will double as an emergency VHF aerial if necessary. This has been concurrent with my choosing a suite of electronics which will be relatively future-proof, cost-effective and not too onerous to install. My needs were centred around three things really: 1. The desire to have an electronic heading sensor as a principal steering compass, given the likelihood of large deviations on my magnetic compass, even when corrected; 2. my desire for an AIS transponder rather than just a receiver, so I can transmit my own AIS data – important in places like Iceland and Norway if you don’t want to be reporting by radio or email every few hours; 3. my need for a display for the heading sensor, as well as a in-cockpit plotter display of some sort; 4. the desire for NMEA data over wifi to feed a main nav computer (PC) at the nav station, as well as possibly a tablet or other device in the cockpit to satisfy No. 3. I was originally looking at a small (standard 110mm square) Multi-Function Display (MFD) which could display my heading as well as other GPS info and possibly log speed and depth, and a tablet to satisfy the need for an in-cockpit plotter to use during coastal sailing and pilotage. During my perambulations upon the internet-of-all-things looking for a decent, up-to-date and not-too-expensive heading sensor, I came across a Chinese company called Onwa, who market a 9-axis sensor, which as far as I can tell sits somewhere between an older-style fluxgate electronic compass and a full-blown GPS compass. It seems to be less affected by magnetic influences than a fluxgate, and has a GPS element to it as well. I’ve been trying to work out what the 9 axes are: perhaps roll, pitch, yaw, surge, sway, heave, then 3 more… Anyway, on enquiring with the only UK dealer (I’ll give them a plug, as they’ve been very helpful: Aves Marine, who I think are based in Strathaven – www.avesmarine.com), this can come with either a dedicated display (quite big and a bit unnecessary), or as a standalone unit which can clag into a MFD or plotter via NMEA 0183. My initial thought was to get a standalone sensor with a MFD from another manufacturer, but I was looking out of curiosity at Onwa’s plotters, and not only are the more basic units very reasonably priced, but they can be bought with a built-in AIS transponder, and also serve duty as a MFD. This means that by using one of these plus the heading sensor, I can satisfy most of my needs with one screen. Aves also sell the Yakbitz range of simple NMEA converters – I used one of these in Meander to transmit NMEA data over wifi, and can do so again in Serchthrift. So I have recently taken delivery of one of their 7-inch plotters, a heading sensor, a Yakker 2-port to wifi converter / multiplexer, and a second GPS antenna to use with a second, standalone back-up GPS (most likely this will be incorporated into my VHF set, with a repeater for the GPS data either in the cockpit or at the nav station, depending on where I decide to mount the VHF (a posh one could be mounted below with a second handset and GPS repeater in the cockpit, or a cheaper one near the companionway with the GPS repeater down below). One exciting upshot of this shopping spree, is that I had to obtain my ship’s radio licence before ordering, so I had the information (MMSI, callsign) with which the AIS part of the plotter needed programming into it. This is all very exciting and the ship now officially existing on paper makes the end of the project seem just a smidgen closer!

As a result of all my recent cable pulling, the conduit on the starboard side of the cabin is full, with just lighting cable running down the port side. This is mainly because the nav station and main switch panel are on the starboard side, so I will need to be slightly more imaginative if I need to run any more cables forward! The other cables that have gradually been making their way aft are the sounder and log transducer cables (which are too short as supplied to reach the aft face of the doghouse where I intend to mount the display, so extensions are required) and the sensor cable from the black water tank. All tank gauges will be mounted adjacent to the switch panel, and I have even managed to find matching gauges! These will service the two fresh water tanks (one gauge, with a selector switch), the black water tank, and the main (keel) fuel tank. The only tanks without gauges will be the fuel day tank (semi-transparent and visible in the technical space under the cockpit) and the grey water tank (also semi-transparent, but under the sole, this is essentially a tank which, if pumped out daily, does not need a gauge – it will also tell you when it is full by backing up grey water into the sinks!). These three cables run aft from under the heads / forecabin sole via the stbd settee locker. With all these cables now hanging in coils in various places, the boat is starting to look like a proper ship build!

Lastly over the past couple of weekends, I have been designing and building the four dorade boxes for the cabin vents. There are actually five boxes required, but the final one for the foredeck vent I will tackle separately, as it requires a different design; the others are all identical (albeit handed, two for the port side and two for the stbd side). I was originally hoping to put these together out of hardwood, as several years ago I acquired a couple of nice planks of what I thought was teak, but is actually possibly Iroko or even a less suitable red hardwood. Anyway, after measuring the boards, it turned out I do not have enough, so in the end I used scraps of 12mm marine ply, which will be thoroughly slathered in epoxy and painted to match the doghouse, and should look nice. To start this project, I first needed (a) the vent cowls which would go atop the boxes, and (b) some means of closing the vents down from below, for which I acquired in boat jumbles over the years four mushroom vents. Knowing the sizes of these items, I could then determine the size the boxes needed to be for sufficient space and airflow, using the original Olin Stephens design for dorade vents (for the famous 1929 yawl Dorade) as a rough guide. His design did not have mushroom vents inside enabling full closure of the vent in heavy weather, but otherwise the principal of a box to separate water from air remains. These boxes have ended up being about 330mm long, 160mm wide and 130mm high (on average, allowing for deck camber). I started a bit of a one-man production line, first cutting all the parts (for each box: 2 sides, two ends, a top and a “dam” across the middle inside). I decided the best way to assemble these was to dowel all the joints and glue up with my usual polyurethane wood glue. These joints will then be filleted with thickened epoxy, any gaps on the outside (fortunately few due to my improving woodworking skills) also filled with epoxy filler, before I coat the whole assembly with three coats of epoxy resin, then painting with the same two-pack system as the doghouse. With their rounded edges all round and nice painted finish, these should look almost like moulded GRP, but classier!

That pretty much sums up what I have achieved since the last update; now I shall just outline my plans for the summer epoxying season. Timber having been sourced from Pol Bergius for the foremast, and due for delivery by mid-July, I intend to get set up for building that mast in my July / August leave period, as well as hopefully doing the modifications required to the mainmast. These entail scarfing on a short extension (400mm) to the foot, making the mast up to the length required in my sailplan; routing a groove for running the light and VHF aerial cables, laying the cables in said groove, then glueing in a spline and planing back to the round; and finally eight-siding the (currently square-section) lower couple of metres of the mast (in conjunction with the extension) so that it fits down the round hole at the partners. Both masts will then need sanding, epoxying and painting – all hopefully in three weeks before boats start piling back inti the shed for next winter. My leave period coming up (from this weekend up until the end of the first week in June) will be taken up continuing some of my ongoing projects, as well as making sure I am fully prepared for the mast work, with all necessary materials and consumables purchased. I will also need a new table saw, as my current Noddy saw does not incline to the 45 degrees required to cut the birdsmouths in the mast staves. I will explain more about the birdsmouth method of building a mast in future posts! However, the first two weeks of said leave period are booked up with a week on TS Royalist, doing a familiarisation trip, and then a week puffing on VIC-32, to both of which I am very much looking forward, but it will make for a very busy leave! I will hopefully update you again on my return to Kyle in June.