Interior update

It has been more of the same here in Salt Lake, Beth and I have been working a lot.  Beth has been managing at Cucina a few days a week and I have been working on a remodel part time.  Because of all this real work, the boat has been a little slower than normal.  But here's what we have been working on...

 Much of my effort lately has been put into our built in water tanks.  I coated them 3 times with epoxy to make sure they were water tight, then 3 coats of this potable water safe epoxy paint.

The fun started when I had to bond the lids/floor of the boat on.  I had to put the lids on and then reach in through those holes to put fillets around all the spots the lid was contacting.  These fillets make sure that the tank will be water tight, and hold the lid down.

It was a tough job.  You can't just look in and see any of the fillets, so Beth and I took turns taking photos of the inside of the tank.  If you weren't on photo duty they you were laying on the tank with your entire arm inside trying to smear epoxy in the spots where you saw void in the picture.  

 The v-berth is just about finished, Beth has painted most of it, she's starting to work on varnishing the frames working on the cabinet fronts.  We had a good amount of salvaged teak and mahogany from the Tartan, but not enough to do the whole boat.  So we are using teak and mahogany for the v-birth, but the rest of the boat will likely be something else.

We have both been wearing a respirator when painting, and can't help talking like Bane from the new Batman movie.  

Here you can see we have built a rough mock-up of the kitchen, the sink will be over by the ladder and the stove/oven goes in the section closest to us.  

Next I will start on the dinette.  These smaller projects are so fun to work on, its motivating to be able to see things going together and be able to check off little sections of the boat as complete.

Hopefully photos of the v-birth with the teak/mahogany varnished and installed for next time. 

Cody and Beth

Decisions Decisions

The boat is like a whole new project now.  It has been nice working on things that you can see progressing.  The two big projects we have been working on are the v-berth and the water tanks.  Everything we do ends up requiring discussion and lots of deliberating before we come up with a plan. We both have a hard time just deciding on the way something should be, even the seemingly simple things.  Anyway look at some of the pics and I'll explain how we got to where we are now.

Soon to be water tanks

Water tanks.  We are building integral water tanks into the boat, which means that we will just put a lid on the floor timbers and then the bilge will be made into a water tank.  There is no wasted space and it allows us make use of an area in the boat that usually isn't easy to access anyway.  But back to decisions.  First we wanted to do just two independent tanks, then it was three independent tanks, then three tanks all linked together, now we have finally ended up with two tanks linked together and the third is independent.   Because the tanks are in the bilge, they create a dam that prevents bilge water from about half the boat from making its way to the low point.  This is a problem, but after much deliberating we solved it by installing a drain pipe that goes through the water tanks.  

  

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Getting pretty creative with clamping devices to hold the face of our v-berth cabinet on while the glue sets.

Cardboard makes great template material for those hard to get to pieces.

After much consideration I decided on mortising the deck beams behind the frames.  Here I make a few saw cuts to guide my chisel.

After the cuts are made its easy to knock the pieces out and clean it up with a chisel.

 One project that let our minds rest was the anchor locker.  Pretty hard to screw this one up, just put heavy fiberglass cloth in and paint it with epoxy.

 I took this photo last night, the v-birth is almost ready for paint!  We salvaged a bunch of mahogany and teak from the Tartan, so we are using some of it for the cabinets and shelves.  I think this will be the only spot on the boat that is made of these woods. We don't have enough to do the rest of the boat, so we are thinking of using vertical grain fir for much of the decor in the main cabin. 

I glued up the mast for Beth's dinghy a few weeks ago, but we have been too excited about the big boat to finish it.  Here she is working it down from square to round.  4 sides, 8 sides, 16 sides, then she will sand it until its round.

Anyway, the psych is high and we are making good progress, even with our indecision.  Hoping to have some cabinets painted(if we can decide on paint color) by the next post!

Roll Baby Roll!!

We thought we might be ready by May 1st.  But then Cody went to Brooklyn for two weeks.  Then we thought maybe we could do it in mid June, but then we travelled, and time slipped away.  We just made it before August.

Cody finally finished the fairing process- a huge relief- and painted on a few coats of epoxy to seal and protect the hull.  He then built two large, square wheels that went around the boat, and attached caster wheels (think big shopping-cart wheels) to the base of the square wheels.  Cody and I rolled it so that the stern was poking out the garage door,  and waited for our friends to arrive.



When the man-power arrived, we rolled the boat out of the shop.  We attached long nylon tow-straps to the square wheels, and hooked those to the trailer hitch of a truck, which would act as an anchor once the rolling began.  The guys got into position and lifted the edge of the boat.  The square wheels tipped easily, and soon the weight of the boat was on the truck.  I backed the truck slowly, and the boat tipped until it was laying on it's side.  We readjusted the tow-straps and moved the caster wheels, and repeated the process once more.  Then the boat was upright, and ready to roll back into the shop.

We're working on the video...  It should be up soon.

It's so fun to have an upright boat.  Cody has been working on the V-Berth, and we're deciding on things like where to put shelves, and what kind of water tanks to install, and what paint colors to use on the interior.   It's a nice change from fairing and sanding.  

  

We also took a little trip up to the...

Grand Teton!

We joined our friends Pj and Sarah Mannion, also Maddie and Tyler McQueen for a single day climb of the Grand.  

We got a good alpine start, and were leaving the parking lot at the base around 3:45 am.  

It's mostly a hike to the top of the Teton.  In the seven miles to the upper saddle, the trail gains about 7000 feet of elevation. 

We had lovely weather for the day, sunny and warm.  

We made good time on the approach, and were at the upper saddle by 11:00am or so.  

Our selected route, the classic Owen Spalding, was totally packed when we arrived.  It's the easiest route to the top, and while it would be the fastest route for our large party, it also attracts the most inexperienced climbers.  

We deliberated in the cold of the wind and shade of the upper Saddle, and ended up with a split decision.  Cody and Tyler opted to climb an alternate route, a 5.6.  PJ, Sarah, Maddie and I decided to summit the Enclosure, a peak just on the other side of the saddle.  The Enclosure is shorter than the Grand by a few hundred feet, and was a great sunny spot to watch Tyler and Cody climb, and admire the view.  

The Summit of the Enclosure.

This is the view of the very top of the Grand Teton, as seen from the Enclosure.  If you click on the photo, it should get larger, and if you look closely, you might be able to see climbers.  We counted at least twenty.  

The Teton Range is a beautiful place.  We were all pretty tired for the hike out, but were loving the scenery.