Good Weather for Fairing

We finally had some fine weather here this past week, after a prolonged cold spell.  I took the opportunity to get back to the filling and fairing process on the cabin tops.  If you recall from my last post way back when, all fiberglass sheathing has been done on the cabin tops and sides, and except for making the companionway hatches, all that remains is to fair, prime and paint.

I use a combination of wide drywall blades to spread the epoxy fairing compound, working off of a piece of scrap plywood for a palette. 

Here, the big fillet fairing in the coamings for the Bomar ventilation hatches is touched up with another pass of the filleting tool. 

The joint between the laminated plywood companionway coamings and the surrounding cabin roof gets a small fillet.  The coamings will also be sheathed in fiberglass to prevent checking and water penetration. 

Here, you can see large areas of fresh fairing compound spread on the aft cabin bulkhead and aft part of the roof.

Work on the boat has been sporadic and at a minimum over the last three months.  The primary reason has not been the cold, but rather the huge amount of work I've had to do to complete my latest book in time for the contract deadline.  That writing has been completed.  The manuscript was finished by January 1st and as of last night I just finished the revisions and final additions.  My publisher is rushing to get this book into print by the scheduled publication date of May 1.

Readers who have been following this blog from the beginning will realize that it was exactly three years ago today that I first posted here with photos of the first load of plywood and first parts cut out for the boat.  Three years would have seemed like a long time if I had thought it would take that long or longer when I started building.  But looking back on it, the time has passed so quickly that I don't know where it went.  The bottom line is that it really doesn't matter.  A project like this takes both time and money, and life is full of other commitments and distractions.  The important thing it that I'm still enjoying every hour I get to work on the boat, and I'm closer than ever to sailing it.  I'm expecting to get the final push to completion into high gear soon.

Sailmaking Weather Again

I returned from Florida this week with renewed enthusiasm to get back to building, but working in an open shed this time of year is hit and miss. Tuesday was a fairly nice day and I did some work on the starboard hull companionway steps and made some other interior layout decisions. But yesterday was a whole day of steady cold rain, which turned to snow this morning. By noon today everything was covered, but it won't last long as temperatures are rising again.

The jib that I assembled last spring from a Sailrite kit has been stored away awaiting the finish work that must be done by hand. I got it out yesterday and started to work on the corners. The Sailrite kits utilize sewn brass rings for reinforcing the tack, head and clew rather than pressed rings. Installing them takes some time, but is rather pleasant work, hand sewing with the help of an awl and sailmaker's palm.

Below is the sewn-in ring for the tack. I had already completed the installation of the wire luff, which is also hand-sewn into the corner of the sail.

After the ring is sewn in place through all the layers of Dacron reinforcing patches in the corner, it is then laced to the thimble of the luff wire using about 40 turns of waxed sailmaker's twine.

The final step in finishing the corner is to dress it in protective leather. This was also done with an awl and sailmaker's twine. The photo below shows the tack. The head of the sail is treated the same way, and is also complete.

The clew of the jib is done a bit different, as there is no wire or thimble to reinforce. Instead, a larger #9 brass ring is sewn into the corner and then using a die set and hammer, a #9 brass eyelet is pressed inside the ring to form a smooth, chafe-proof interior for attaching the jib sheets. The outer corner is protected by a strip of leather.

There are two more rings like the above one at the clew that must be sewn in at the reef point tack and clew. Then I have to install the grommets for the reef points and hanks and then the hanks, and this sail will be finished.

Close Call with a Tornado

Last Friday, at around noon, I had just finished applying another coat of epoxy to the interior of the Backwoods Drifter I have almost finished building in the garage shop in Jackson. I was about to start back to work on the crossbeams for Element II, which need fairing in preparation for fiberglassing when my girlfriend, Michelle, told me we were under a tornado warning.

The sky was dark, but there was no rain yet, just a thick, warm humidity hanging in the air. Warning sirens begin to sound and I started to close the garage door in case rain should blow in on my fresh epoxy, but when I tried, the power suddenly went off. I stood in the open garage door looking out, and out of nowhere a tremendous wind began gusting and I began to hear the sound of snapping trees. I saw branches flying horizontally through the air and heard thuds of small objects hitting the roof and sides of the house. I ran inside and found Michelle and her daughter, Jasmine, huddled on the floor in the hall. The sound of breaking trees was intense, as the house is in an old neighborhood with many tall pines, oaks and other hardwoods. I went back to the garage to try to get the door down manually and just as I looked out heard another loud breaking sound and watched as the entire service line on the street in front of the house went down. This is the view from the garage:

I knew the storm was over when the wind subsided after maybe ten minutes and the warm humid air was replaced by a sudden cool. Checking around, I found that the house did not get hit by any trees, but we had a near miss with this one in the backyard that thankfully missed the kitchen by a few feet and only took out part of the fence.

Trees like these were down all over the neighborhood, many on top of or through the framing of houses. Later that day, as we got out beyond our immediate area, we were to find out that the damage was widespread in the city and surrounding area, and more than 700 homes were damaged, including 50 that were completely demolished. 90,000 people were without power, as utility poles everywhere were trashed as bad as ours.

I found out later that is was a near miss indeed. The National Weather Service determined that the storm front that passed through the area generated five tornadoes. The one that did all this damage was an F2 tornado that passed just a few blocks north of us, and stayed above the ground, cutting a 900-yard wide path of destruction. If it had been on the ground, the results would have been much worse. As it turned out, no one was killed by this tornado, but a lot of people suffered property damage. The power was just restored yesterday, and phone service will not be back until tomorrow. When I get back to the work in the garage later today, the first thing I have to do is clean out all the debris that was blown in the open door and sand the stuck leaves out of my cured epoxy.